BOOKS    BY    HENRY    JAMES 

PUBLISHED  BY  CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 


THE  OUTCRY  (postage  extra)      .    »*/$i. 25 

THE  FINER  GRAIN      .    ...   net  1.25 

THE  SACRED  FOUNT 1.50 

THE  WINGS  OF  THE  DOVE,  2  vois.  2.50 

THE  BETTER  SORT 1.50 

THE  GOLDEN  BOWL,  2  vols.  .    .    .  2.50 

NOVELS  AND  TALES.   NEW  YORK  EDITION 
24  vols.,  tut  $48.00 


THE  OUTCRY 


THE    OUTCRY 


BY 

HENRY  JAMES 


NEW  YORK 

CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 
1911 


COPYRIGHT,  1911,  BT 
CHARLES   SCRIBNER'S  SONS 


Published  September,  1911 


BOOK  FIRST 


255437 


,  my  lord,"  Banks  had  replied,  "no  stranger 
has  yet  arrived.  But  I'll  see  if  any  one  has 
come  in — or  who  has."  As  he  spoke,  however,  he 
observed  Lady  Sandgate's  approach  to  the  hall  by  the 
entrance  giving  upon  the  great  terrace,  and  addressed 
her  on  her  passing  the  threshold.  "Lord  John,  my 
lady."  With  which,  his  duty  majestically  performed, 
he  retired  to  the  quarter — that  of  the  main  access  to 
the  spacious  centre  of  the  house — from  which  he  had 
ushered  the  visitor. 

This  personage,  facing  Lady  Sandgate  as  she 
paused  there  a  moment  framed  by  the  large  doorway 
to  the  outer  expanses,  the  small  pinkish  paper  of  a 
folded  telegram  in  her  hand,  had  partly  before  him, 
as  an  immediate  effect,  the  high  wide  interior,  still 
breathing  the  quiet  air  and  the  fair  pannelled  security 
of  the  couple  of  hushed  and  stored  centuries,  in  which 
certain  of  the  reputed  treasures  of  Dedborougk  Place 
beautifully  disposed  themselves;  and  then,  through 
ample  apertures  and  beyond  the  stately  stone  out 
works  of  the  great  seated  and  supported  house — up 
lifting  terrace,  balanced,  balustraded  steps  and  con 
taining  basins  where  splash  and  spray  were  at  rest — 

3 


THE  OUTCRY 

all  the  rich  composed  extension  of  garden  and  lawn 
and  park.  An  ancient,  an  assured  elegance  seemed 
to  reign;  pictures  and  preserved  "pieces,"  cabinets 
and  tapestries,  spoke,  each  for  itself,  of  fine  selection 
and  high  distinction;  while  the  originals  of  the  old 
portraits,  in  more  or  less  deserved  salience,  hung  over 
the  happy  scene  as  the  sworn  members  of  a  great 
guild  might  have  sat,  on  the  beautiful  April  day,  at 
one  of  their  annual  feasts. 

Such  was  the  setting  confirmed  by  generous  time, 
but  the  handsome  woman  of  considerably  more  than 
forty  whose  entrance  had  all  but  coincided  with  that 
of  Lord  John  either  belonged,  for  the  eye,  to  no  such 
complacent  company  or  enjoyed  a  relation  to  it  in 
which  the  odd  twists  and  turns  of  history  must  have 
been  more  frequent  than  any  dull  avenue  or  easy 
sequence.  Lady  Sandgate  was  shiningly  modern, 
and  perhaps  at  no  point  more  so  than  by  the  effect  of 
her  express  repudiation  of  a  mundane  future  certain 
to  be  more  and  more  offensive  to  women  of  real  quality 
and*  of  formed  taste.  Clearly,  at  any  rate,  in  her 
hands,  the  clue  to  the  antique  confidence  had  lost  it 
self,  and  repose,  however  founded,  had  given  way  to 
curiosity — that  is  to  speculation — however  disguised. 
She  might  have  consented,  or  even  attained,  to  being 
but  gracefully  stupid,  but  she  would  presumably  have 
confessed,  if  put  on  her  trial  for  restlessness  or  for 

4 


THE  OUTCRY 

intelligence,  that  she  was,  after  all,  almost  clever 
enough  to  be  vulgar.  Unmistakably,  moreover,  she 
had  still,  with  her  fine  stature,  her  disciplined  figure, 
her  cherished  complexion,  her  bright  important  hair, 
her  kind  bold  eyes  and  her  large  constant  smile,  the 
degree  of  beauty  that  might  pretend  to  put  every  other 
question  by. 

Lord  John  addressed  her  as  with  a  significant  man 
ner  that  he  might  have  had — that  of  a  lack  of  need,  or 
even  of  interest,  for  any  explanation  about  herself:  it 
would  have  been  clear  that  he  was  apt  to  discriminate 
with  sharpness  among  possible  claims  on  his  atten 
tion.  "I  luckily  find  you  at  least,  Lady  Sandgate — 
they  tell  me  Theign's  off  somewhere." 

She  replied  as  with  the  general  habit,  on  her  side, 
of  bland  reassurance;  it  mostly  had  easier  conse 
quences — for  herself — than  the  perhaps  more  showy 
creation  of  alarm.  "Only  off  in  the  park — open 
to-day  for  a  school-feast  from  Dedborough,  as  you 
may  have  made  out  from  the  avenue;  giving  good 
advice,  at  the  top  of  his  lungs,  to  four  hundred  and 
fifty  children." 

It  was  such  a  scene,  and  such  an  aspect  of  the  per 
sonage  so  accounted  for,  as  Lord  John  could  easily 
take  in,  and  his  recognition  familiarly  smiled.  "Oh 
he's  so  great  on  such  occasions  that  I'm  sorry  to  be 
missing  it." 

5 


THE  OUTCRY 

"I've  had  to  miss  it,"  Lady  Sandgate  sighed — 
"that  is  to  miss  the  peroration.  I've  just  left  them, 
but  he  had  even  then  been  going  on  for  twenty  min 
utes,  and  I  dare  say  that  if  you  care  to  take  a  look 
you'll  find  him,  poor  dear  victim  of  duty,  still  at  it." 

"  I'll  warrant — for,  as  I  often  tell  him,  he  makes  the 
idea  of  one's  duty  an  awful  thing  to  his  friends  by  the 
extravagance  with  which  he  always  overdoes  it." 
And  the  image  itself  appeared  in  some  degree  to 
prompt  this  particular  edified  friend  to  look  at  his 
watch  and  consider.  "I  should  like  to  come  in  for 
the  grand  finale,  but  I  rattled  over  in  a  great  measure 
to  meet  a  party,  as  he  calls  himself — and  calls,  if  you 
please,  even  me! — who's  motoring  down  by  appoint 
ment  and  whom  I  think  I  should  be  here  to  receive; 
as  well  as  a  little,  I  confess,  in  the  hope  of  a  glimpse 
of  Lady  Grace:  if  you  can  perhaps  imagine  thati" 

"I  can  imagine  it  perfectly,"  said  Lady  Sandgate, 
whom  evidently  no  perceptions  of  that  general  order 
ever  cost  a  strain.  "It  quite  sticks  out  of  you,  and 
every  one  moreover  has  for  some  time  past  been  wait 
ing  to  see.  But  you  haven't  then,"  she  added,  "come 
from  town?" 

"No,  I'm  for  three  days  at  Chanter  with  my 
mother;  whom,  as  she  kindly  lent  me  her  car,  I  should 
have  rather  liked  to  bring." 

Lady  Sandgate  left  the  unsaid,  in  this  connection, 
6 


THE  OUTCRY 

languish  no  longer  than  was  decent.  "  But  whom  you 
doubtless  had  to  leave,  by  her  preference,  just  settling 
down  to  bridge." 

"Oh,  to  sit  down  would  imply  that  my  mother  at 
some  moment  of  the  day  gets  up !" 

"Which  the  Duchess  never  does?" — Lady  Sand- 
gate  only  asked  to  be  allowed  to  show  how  she  saw  it. 
"She  fights  to  the  last,  invincible;  gathering  in  the 
spoils  and  only  routing  her  friends?"  She  abounded 
genially  in  her  privileged  vision.  "Ah  yes — we  know 
something  of  that!" 

Lord  John,  who  was  a  young  man  of  a  rambling  but 
not  of  an  idle  eye,  fixed  her  an  instant  with  a  surprise 
that  was  yet  not  steeped  in  compassion.  "You  too 
then?" 

She  wouldn't,  however,  too  meanly  narrow  it  down. 
"Well,  in  this  house  generally;  where  I'm  so  often 
made  welcome,  you  see,  and  where " 

"Where,"  he  broke  in  at  once,  "your  jolly  good 
footing  quite  sticks  out  of  yoUj  perhaps  you'll  let  me 
say!" 

She  clearly  didn't  mind  his  seeing  her  ask  herself 
how  she  should  deal  with  so  much  rather  juvenile 
intelligence;  and  indeed  she  could  only  decide  to 
deal  quite  simply.  "You  can't  say  more  than  I 
feel — and  am  proud  to  feel! — at  being  of  comfort 
when  they're  worried." 

7 


THE  OUTCRY 

This  but  fed  the  light  flame  of  his  easy  perception 
— which  lighted  for  him,  if  she  would,  all  the  facts 
equally.  "And  they're  worried  now,  you  imply,  be 
cause  my  terrible  mother  is  capable  of  heavy  gains 
and  of  making  a  great  noise  if  she  isn't  paid?  I 
ought  to  mind  speaking  of  that  truth,"  he  went  on  as 
/ with  a  practised  glance  in  the  direction  of  delicacy; 
"but  I  think  I  should  like  you  to  know  that  I  myself 
am  not  a  bit  ignorant  of  why  it  has  made  such  an 
impression  here." 

Lady  Sandgate  forestalled  his  knowledge.  "Be 
cause  poor  Kitty  Imber — who  should  either  never 
touch  a  card  or  else  learn  to  suffer  in  silence,  as  I've 
had  to,  goodness  knows! — has  thrown  herself,  with 
her  impossible  big  debt,  upon  her  father?  whom  she 
thinks  herself  entitled  to  'look  to'  even  more  as  a 
lovely  young  widow  with  a  good  jointure  than  she 
formerly  did  as  the  mere  most  beautiful  daughter  at 
home." 

She  had  put  the  picture  a  shade  interrogatively,  but 
this  was  as  nothing  to  the  note  of  free  inquiry  in  Lord 
John's  reply.  "You  mean  that  our  lovely  young 
widows — to  say  nothing  of  lovely  young  wives — ought 
by  this  time  to  have  made  out,  in  predicaments,  how 
to  turn  round?" 

His  temporary  hostess,  even  with  his  eyes  on  her, 
appeared  to  decide  after  a  moment  not  wholly  to  dis- 


THE  OUTCRY 

own  his  thought.  But  she  smiled  for  it.  "Well,  in 
that  set !" 

"My  mother's  set?"  However,  if  she  could  smile 
he  could  laugh.  "I'm  much  obliged!" 

"Oh,"  she  qualified,  "I  don't  criticise  her  Grace; 
but  the  ways  and  traditions  and  tone  of  this  house " 

"Make  it" — he  took  her  sense  straight  from  her — 
"the  house  in  England  where  one  feels  most  the  false 
note  of  a  dishevelled  and  bankrupt  elder  daughter 
breaking  in  with  a  list  of  her  gaming  debts — to  say 
nothing  of  others! — and  wishing  to  have  at  least  those 
wiped  out  in  the  interest  of  her  reputation  ?  Exactly 
so,"  he  went  on  before  she  could  meet  it  with  a  diplo 
matic  ambiguity;  "and  just  that,  I  assure  you,  is  a 
large  part  of  the  reason  I  like  to  come  here — since  I 
personally  don't  come  with  any  such  associations." 

"Not  the  association  of  bankruptcy — no;  as  you 
represent  the  payee!" 

The  young  man  appeared  to  regard  this  imputation 
for  a  moment  almost  as  a  liberty  taken.  "How  do 
you  know  so  well,  Lady  Sandgate,  what  I  repre 
sent?" 

She  bethought  herself — but  briefly  and  bravely. 
"Well,  don't  you  represent,  by  your  own  admission, 
certain  fond  aspirations?  Don't  you  represent  the 
belief — very  natural,  I  grant — that  more  than  one 
perverse  and  extravagant  flower  will  be  unlikely  on 

9 


THE  OUTCRY 

such  a  fine  healthy  old  stem;  and,  consistently  with 
that,  the  hope  of  arranging  with  our  admirable  host 
here  that  he  shall  lend  a  helpful  hand  to  your  com 
mending  yourself  to  dear  Grace?" 

Lord  John  might,  in  the  light  of  these  words,  have 
felt  any  latent  infirmity  in  such  a  pretension  exposed; 
but  as  he  stood  there  facing  his  chances  he  would  have 
struck  a  spectator  as  resting  firmly  enough  on  some 
felt  residuum  of  advantage:  whether  this  were  clev 
erness  or  luck,  the  strength  of  his  backing  or  that  of  his 
sincerity.  Even  with  the  young  woman  to  whom  our 
friends'  reference  thus  broadened  still  a  vague  quan 
tity  for  us,  you  would  have  taken  his  sincerity  as  quite 
possible — and  this  despite  an  odd  element  in  him  that 
you  might  have  described  as  a  certain  delicacy  of  bru 
tality.  This  younger  son  of  a  noble  matron  recog 
nised  even  by  himself  as  terrible -en  joyed  in  no  im 
mediate  or  aggressive  manner  any  imputable  private 
heritage  or  privilege  of  arrogance.  He  would  on  the 
contrary  have  irradiated  fineness  if  his  lustre  hadn't 
been  a  little  prematurely  dimmed.  Active  yet  in 
substantial,  he  was  slight  and  short  and  a  trifle  too 
punctually,  though  not  yet  quite  lamentably,  bald. 
Delicacy  was  in  the  arch  of  his  eyebrow,  the  finish  of 
his  facial  line,  the  economy  of  "treatment"  by  which 
his  negative  nose  had  been  enabled  to  look  important 
and  his  meagre  mouth  to  smile  its  spareness  away. 

10 


THE  OUTCRY 

He  had  pleasant  but  hard  little  eyes — they  glittered, 
handsomely,  without  promise — and  a  neatness,  a  cool 
ness  and  an  ease,  a  clear  instinct  for  making  point 
take,  on  his  behalf,  the  place  of  weight  and  immunity 
that  of  capacity,  which  represented  somehow  the  art 
of  living  at  a  high  pitch  and  yet  at  a  low  cost.  There 
was  that  in  his  satisfied  air  which  still  suggested  sharp 
wants — and  this  was  withal  the  ambiguity;  for  the 
temper  of  these  appetites  or  views  was  certainly,  you 
would  have  concluded,  not  such  as  always  to  sacri 
fice  to  form.  If  he  really,  for  instance,  wanted  Lady 
Grace,  the  passion  or  the  sense  of  his  interest  in  it 
would  scarce  have  been  considerately  irritable. 

"May  I  ask  what  you  mean,"  he  inquired  of  Lady 
Sandgate,  "by  the  question  of  my  ' arranging'?'1 

"I  mean  that  you're  the  very  clever  son  of  a  very 
clever  mother." 

"  Oh,  I'm  less  clever  than  you  think,"  he  replied — 
"if  you  really  think  it  of  me  at  all;  and  mamma's  a 
good  sight  cleverer!" 

"  Than  I  think  ?  "  Lady  Sandgate  echoed.  "  Why, 
she's  the  person  in  all  our  world  I  would  gladly  most 
resemble — for  her  general  ability  to  put  what  she  wants 
through."  But  she  at  once  added:  "That  is  if—V 
pausing  on  it  with  a  smile. 

"If  what  then?" 

"Well,  if  I  could  be  absolutely  certain  to  have  all 
ii 


THE  OUTCRY 

her  kinds  of  cleverness  without  exception — and  to  have 
them,"  said  Lady  Sandgate,  "to  the  very  end." 

He  definitely,  he  almost  contemptuously  declined 
to  follow  her.  "The  very  end  of  what?" 

She  took  her  choice  as  amid  all  the  wonderful  di 
rections  there  might  be,  and  then  seemed  both  to  risk 
and  to  reserve  something.  "Say  of  her  so  wonder 
fully  successful  general  career." 

It  doubtless,  however,  warranted  him  in  appearing 
to  cut  insinuations  short.  "  When  you're  as  clever  as 
she  you'll  be  as  good."  To  which  he  subjoined: 
"You  don't  begin  to  have  the  opportunity  of  knowing 
how  good  she  is."  This  pronouncement,  to  whatever 
comparative  obscurity  it  might  appear  to  relegate  her, 
his  interlocutress  had  to  take — he  was  so  prompt  with 
a  more  explicit  challenge.  "What  is  it  exactly  that 
you  suppose  yourself  to  know?" 

Lady  Sandgate  had  after  a  moment,  in  her  supreme 
good  humour,  decided  to  take  everything.  "I  al 
ways  proceed  on  the  assumption  that  I  know  every 
thing,  because  that  makes  people  tell  me." 

"It  wouldn't  make  me,"  he  quite  rang  out,  "if  I 
didn't  want  to!  But  as  it  happens,"  he  allowed, 
"there's  a  question  it  would  be  convenient  to  me  to 
put  to  you.  You  must  be,  with  your  charming  un 
conventional  relation  with  him,  extremely  in  Theign's 
confidence." 

12 


THE  OUTCRY 

She  waited  a  little  as  for  more.  "  Is  that  your  ques 
tion — whether  I  am?" 

"No,  but  if  you  are  you'll  the  better  answer  it." 

She  had  no  objection  then  to  answering  it  beauti 
fully.  "We're  the  best  friends  in  the  world;  he  has 
been  really  my  providence,  as  a  lone  woman  with  al 
most  nobody  and  nothing  of  her  own,  and  I  feel  my 
footing  here,  as  so  frequent  and  yet  so  discreet  a  vis 
itor,  simply  perfect.  But  I'm  happy  to  say  that — for 
my  pleasure  when  I'm  really  curious — this  doesn't 
close  to  me  the  sweet  resource  of  occasionally  guessing 
things." 

"Then  I  hope  you've  ground  for  believing  that 
if  I  go  the  right  way  about  it  he's  likely  to  listen  to 
me." 

Lady  Sandgate  measured  her  ground — which  scarce 
seemed  extensive.  "  The  person  he  most  listens  to  just 
now — and  in  fact  at  any  time,  as  you  must  have  seen 
for  yourself — is  that  arch-tormentor,  or  at  least  beau 
tiful  wheedler,  his  elder  daughter." 

"Lady  Imber's  here?"  Lord  John  alertly  asked. 

"She  arrived  last  night  and — as  we've  other  vis 
itors — seems  to  have  set  up  a  side-show  in  the  gar 
den." 

"Then  she'll  'draw'  of  course  immensely,  as  she  al 
ways  does.  But  her  sister  won't  be  in  that  case  with 
her,"  the  young  man  supposed. 

13 


THE  OUTCRY 

"  Because  Grace  feels  herself  naturally  an  indepen 
dent  show?  So  she  well  may,"  said  Lady  Sandgate, 
"  but  I  must  tell  you  that  when  I  last  noticed  them  there 
Kitty  was  in  the  very  act  of  leading  her  away." 

Lord  John  figured  it  a  moment.  "Lady  Imber" — 
he  ironically  enlarged  the  figure — "can  lead  people 
away." 

"Oh,  dear  Grace,"  his  companion  returned,  "hap 
pens  fortunately  to  be  firm!" 

This  seemed  to  strike  him  for  a  moment  as  equivo 
cal.  "Not  against  me,  however — you  don't  mean? 
You  don't  think  she  has  a  beastly  prejudice ?" 

"Surely  you  can  judge  about  it;  as  knowing  best 
what  may — or  what  mayn't — have  happened  between 
you." 

"Well,  I  try  to  judge" — and  such  candour  as  was 
possible  to  Lord  John  seemed  to  sit  for  a  moment  on 
his  brow.  "But  I'm  in  fear  of  seeing  her  too  much  as 
I  want  to  see  her." 

There  was  an  appeal  in  it  that  Lady  Sandgate  might 
have  been  moved  to  meet.  "Are  you  absolutely  in 
earnest  about  her?" 

"Of  course  I  am—why  shouldn't  I  be?  But,"  he 
said  with  impatience,  "I  want  help." 

"Very  well  then,  that's  what  Lady  Imber's  giving 
you."  And  as  it  appeared  to  take  him  time  to  read 
into  these  words  their  full  sense,  she  produced  others, 

14 


THE  OUTCRY 

and  so  far  did  help  him — though  the  effort  was  in  a 
degree  that  of  her  exhibiting  with  some  complacency 
her  own  unassisted  control  of  stray  signs  and  shy  lights. 
"  By  telling  her,  by  bringing  it  home  to  her,  that  if  she'll 
make  up  her  mind  to  accept  you  the  Duchess  will  do 
the  handsome  thing.  Handsome,  I  mean,  by  Kitty." 

Lord  John,  appropriating  for  his  convenience  the 
truth  in  this,  yet  regarded  it  as  open  to  a  becoming,  an 
improving  touch  from  himself.  "Well,  and  by  me." 
To  which  he  added  with  more  of  a  challenge  in  it: 
"But  you  really  know  what  my  mother  will  do?" 

"By  my  system,"  Lady  Sandgate  smiled,  "you  see 
I've  guessed.  What  your  mother  will  do  is  what 
brought  you  over!" 

"  Well,  it's  that,"  he  allowed— "and  something  else." 

"Something  else?"  she  derisively  echoed.  "I 
should  think  'that/  for  an  ardent  lover,  would  have 
been  enough." 

"Ah,  but  it's  all  one  job!  I  mean  it's  one  idea,"  he 
hastened  to  explain — "  if  you  think  Lady  Imber's  really 
acting  on  her." 

"Mightn't  you  go  and  see?" 

"I  would  in  a  moment  if  I  hadn't  to  look  out  for  an 
other  matter  too."  And  he  renewed  his  attention  to 
his  watch.  "I  mean  getting  straight  at  my  American, 
the  party  I  just  mentioned " 

But  she  had  already  taken  him  up.  "You  too  have 
15 


THE  OUTCRY 

an  American  and  a  'party/  and  yours  also  motors 
down ?" 

"Mr.  Breckenridge  Bender."  Lord  John  named 
him  with  a  shade  of  elation. 

She  gaped  at  the  fuller  light.  "  You  know  my  Breck 
enridge? — who  I  hoped  was  coming  for  me!" 

Lord  John  as  freely,  but  more  gaily,  wondered. 
"Had  he  told  you  so?" 

She  held  out,  opened,  the  telegram  she  had  kept 
folded  in  her  hand  since  her  entrance.  "He  has  sent 
me  that — which,  delivered  to  me  ten  minutes  ago  out 
there,  has  brought  me  in  to  receive  him." 

The  young  man  read  out  this  missive.  "'Failing 
to  find  you  in  Bruton  Street,  start  in  pursuit  and  hope 
to  overtake  you  about  four."5  It  did  involve  an  am 
biguity.  "Why,  he  has  been  engaged  these  three  days 
to  coincide  with  myself,  and  not  to  fail  of  him  has  been 
part  of  my  business." 

Lady  Sandgate,  in  her  demonstrative  way,  appealed 
to  the  general  rich  scene.  "Then  why  does  he  say  it's 
me  he's  pursuing?" 

He  seemed  to  recognise  promptly  enough  in  her  the 
sense  of  a  menaced  monopoly.  "My  dear  lady,  he's 
pursuing  expensive  works  of  art." 

"By  which  you  imply  that  I'm  one?"  She  might 
have  been  wound  up  by  her  disappointment  to  almost 
any  irony. 

16 


THE  OUTCRY 

"  I  imply — or  rather  I  affirm — that  every  handsome 
woman  is!  But  what  he  arranged  with  me  about," 
Lord  John  explained,  "was  that  he  should  see  the 
Dedborough  pictures  in  general  and  the  great  Sir 
Joshua  in  particular — of  which  he  had  heard  so  much 
and  to  which  I've  been  thus  glad  to  assist  him." 

This  news,  however,  with  its  lively  interest,  but  deep 
ened  the  listener's  mystification.  "Then  why — this 
whole  week  that  I've  been  in  the  house — hasn't  our 
good  friend  here  mentioned  to  me  his  coming?" 

"Because  our  good  friend  here  has  had  no  reason" 
— Lord  John  could  treat  it  now  as  simple  enough. 
"  Good  as  he  is  in  all  ways,  he's  so  best  of  all  about 
showing  the  house  and  its  contents  that  I  haven't  even 
thought  necessary  to  write  him  that  I'm  introducing 
Breckenridge." 

"I  should  have  been  happy  to  introduce  him,"  Lady 
Sandgate  just  quavered — "if  I  had  at  all  known  he 
wanted  it." 

Her  companion  weighed  the  difference  between  them 
and  appeared  to  pronounce  it  a  trifle  he  didn't  care  a 
fig  for.  "I  surrender  you  that  privilege  then — of  pre 
senting  him  to  his  host — if  I've  seemed  to  you  to  snatch 
it  from  you."  To  which  Lord  John  added,  as  with 
liberality  unrestricted,  "But  I've  been  taking  him 
about  to  see  what's  worth  while — as  only  last  week  to 
Lady  Lappington's  Longhi." 

17 


THE  OUTCRY 

This  revelation,  though  so  casual  in  its  form,  fairly 
drew  from  Lady  Sandgate,  as  she  took  it  in,  an  inter 
rogative  wail.  "  Her  Longhi  ?  " 

"Why,  don't  you  know  her  great  Venetian  family 
group,  the  What-do-you-call-'ems  ? — seven  full-length 
figures,  each  one  a  gem,  for  which  he  paid  her  her 
price  before  he  left  the  house." 

She  could  but  make  it  more  richly  resound — almost 
stricken,  lost  in  her  wistful  thought:  "Seven  full- 
length  figures?  Her  price ?" 

"Eight  thousand — slap  down.  Bender  knows," 
said  Lord  John,  "what  he  wants." 

"And  does  he  want  only" — her  wonder  grew  and 
grew—" '  What-do-you-call-'ems'  ?" 

"  He  most  usually  wants  what  he  can't  have."  Lord 
John  made  scarce  more  of  it  than  that.  "But,  awfully 
hard  up  as  I  fancy  her, Lady  Lappington  went  at  him." 

It  determined  in  his  friend  a  boldly  critical  attitude. 
"How  horrible — at  the  rate  things  are  leaving  us!" 
But  this  was  far  from  the  end  of  her  interest.  "And 
is  that  the  way  he  pays?" 

"Before  he  leaves  the  house?"  Lord  John  lived 
it  amusedly  over.  "  Well,  she  took  care  of  that." 

"How  incredibly  vulgar!"  It  all  had,  however, 
for  Lady  Sandgate,  still  other  connections — which 
might  have  attenuated  Lady  Lappington's  case,  though 
she  didn't  glance  at  this.  "He  makes  the  most  scan- 

18 


THE  OUTCRY 

dalous  eyes — the  ruffian! — at  my  great-grandmother." 
And  then  as  richly  to  enlighten  any  blankness:  "My 
tremendous  Lawrence,  don't  you  know  ? — in  her  wed 
ding-dress,  down  to  her  knees;  with  such  extraordi 
narily  speaking  eyes,  such  lovely  arms  and  hands,  such 
wonderful  flesh-tints:  universally  considered  the  mas 
terpiece  of  the  artist." 

Lord  John  seemed  to  look  a  moment  not  so  much  at 
the  image  evoked,  in  which  he  wasn't  interested,  as  at 
certain  possibilities  lurking  behind  it.  "And  are  you 
going  to  sell  the  masterpiece  of  the  artist?" 

She  held  her  head  high.  "I've  indignantly  refused 
— for  all  his  pressing  me  so  hard." 

"  Yet  that's  what  he  nevertheless  pursues  you  to-day 
to  keep  up?" 

The  question  had  a  little  the  ring  of  those  of  which 
the  occupant  of  a  witness-box  is  mostly  the  subject, 
but  Lady  Sandgate  was  so  far  as  this  went  an  imper 
turbable  witness.  "I  need  hardly  fear  it  perhaps  if — 
in  the  light  of  what  you  tell  me  of  your  arrangement 
with  him — his  pursuit  becomes,  where  I  am  concerned, 
a  figure  of  speech." 

"Oh,"  Lord  John  returned,  "he  kills  two  birds 
with  one  stone — he  sees  both  Sir  Joshua  and  you." 

This  version  of  the  case  had  its  effect,  for  the  mo 
ment,  on  his  fair  associate.  "  Does  he  want  to  buy  their 
pride  and  glory?" 

19 


THE  OUTCRY 

The  young  man,  however,  struck  on  his  own  side, 
became  at  first  but  the  bright  reflector  of  her  thought. 
"Is  that  wonder  for  sale?" 

She  closed  her  eyes  as  with  the  shudder  of  hearing 
such  words.  "Not,  surely,  by  any  monstrous  chance! 
Fancy  dear,  proud  Theign !" 

"I  can't  fancy  him — no!"  And  Lord  John  ap 
peared  to  renounce  the  effort.  "But  a  cat  may  look 
at  a  king  and  a  sharp  funny  Yankee  at  anything." 

These  things  might  be,  Lady  Sandgate's  face  and 
gesture  apparently  signified;  but  another  question  di 
verted  her.  "You're  clearly  a  wonderful  showman, 
but  do  you  mind  my  asking  you  whether  you're  on 
such  an  occasion  a — well,  a  closely  interested  one  ?  " 

" 'Interested'  ?"  he  echoed;  though  it  wasn't  to  gain 
time,  he  showed,  for  he  would  in  that  case  have  taken 
more.  "To  the  extent,  you  mean,  of  my  little  per 
centage?"  And  then  as  in  silence  she  but  kept  a 
slightly  grim  smile  on  him:  "  Why  do  you  ask  if — with 
your  high  delicacy  about  your  great-grandmother — 
you've  nothing  to  place?" 

It  took  her  a  minute  to  say,  while  her  fine  eye  only 
rolled;  but  when  she  spoke  that  organ  boldly  rested 
and  the  truth  vividly  appeared.  "I  ask  because  peo 
ple  like  you,  Lord  John,  strike  me  as  dangerous  to  the 
— how  shall  I  name  it? — the  common  weal;  and  be 
cause  of  my  general  strong  feeling  that  we  don't  want 

20 


THE  OUTCRY 

any  more  of  our  national  treasures  (for  I  regard  my 
great-grandmother  as  national)  to  be  scattered  about  v, 
the  world." 

"There's  much  in  this  country  and  age,"  he  replied 
in  an  off-hand  manner,  "to  be  said  about  that."  The 
present,  however,  was  not  the  time  to  say  it  all;  so  he 
said  something  else  instead,  accompanying  it  with  a 
smile  that  signified  sufficiency.  "To  my  friends,  I 
need  scarcely  remark  to  you,  I'm  all  the  friend." 

She  had  meanwhile  seen  the  butler  reappear  by  the 
door  that  opened  to  the  terrace,  and  though  the  high, 
bleak,  impersonal  approach  of  this  functionary  was 
ever,  and  more  and  more  at  every  step,  a  process  to 
defy  interpretation,  long  practice  evidently  now  enabled 
her  to  suggest,  as  she  turned  again  to  her  fellow-visi 
tor  a  reading  of  it.  "It's  the  friend  then  clearly 
who's  wanted  in  the  park." 

She  might,  by  the  way  Banks  looked  at  her,  have 
snatched  from  his  hand  a  missive  addressed  to  another; 
though  while  he  addressed  himself  to  her  companion 
he  allowed  for  her  indecorum  sufficiently  to  take 
it  up  where  she  had  left  it.  "  By  her  ladyship,  my 
lord,  who  sends  to  hope  you'll  join  them  below  the 
terrace." 

"Ah,  Grace  hopes,"  said  Lady  Sandgate  for  the 
young  man's  encouragement.  "There  you  are!" 

Lord  John  took  up  the  motor-cap  he  had  lain  down 
21 


THE  OUTCRY 

on  coming  in.  "I  rush  to  Lady  Grace,  but  don't  de 
moralise  Bender !"  And  he  went  forth  to  the  terrace 
and  the  gardens. 

Banks  looked  about  as  for  some  further  exercise  of 
his  high  function.  "Will  you  have  tea,  my  lady?" 

This  appeared  to  strike  her  as  premature.  "Oh, 
thanks — when  they  all  come  in." 

"They'll  scarcely  all,  my  lady" — he  indicated  re 
spectfully  that  he  knew  what  he  was  talking  about. 
"There's  tea  in  her  ladyship's  tent;  but,"  he  qualified, 
"it  has  also  been  ordered  for  the  saloon." 

"Ah  then,"  she  said  cheerfully,  "Mr.  Bender  will 
be  glad — !"  And  she  became,  with  this,  aware  of  the 
approach  of  another  visitor.  Banks  considered,  up 
and  down,  the  gentleman  ushered  in,  at  the  left,  by 
the  footman  who  had  received  him  at  the  main  en 
trance  to  the  house.  "Here  he  must  be,  my  lady." 
With  which  he  retired  to  the  spacious  opposite  quar 
ter,  where  he  vanished,  while  the  footman,  his  own 
office  performed,  retreated  as  he  had  come,  and  Lady 
Sandgate,  all  hospitality,  received  the  many-sided 
author  of  her  specious  telegram,  of  Lord  John's  irri 
tating  confidence  and  of  Lady  Lappington's  massive 
cheque. 


22 


THE  OUTCRY 

II 

HAVING  greeted  him  with  an  explicitly  gracious 
welcome  and  both  hands  out,  she  had  at  once  gone 
on:  "You'll  of  course  have  tea? — in  the  saloon." 

But  his  mechanism  seemed  of  the  type  that  has  to 
expand  and  revolve  before  sounding.  "  Why;  the  very 
first  thing  ?" 

She  only  desired,  as  her  laugh  showed,  to  accom 
modate.  "Ah,  have  it  the  last  if  you  like!'* 

"You  see  your  English  teas — !"  he  pleaded  as  he 
looked  about  him,  so  immediately  and  frankly  inter 
ested  in  the  place  and  its  contents  that  his  friend 
could  only  have  taken  this  for  the  very  glance  with 
which  he  must  have  swept  Lady  Lappington's  in 
ferior  scene. 

"They're  too  much  for  you?'* 

"Well,  they're  too  many.  I  think  I've  had  two  or 
three  on  the  road — at  any  rate  my  man  did.  I  like 
to  do  business  before — "  But  his  sequence  dropped 
as  his  eye  caught  some  object  across  the  wealth  of 
space. 

She  divertedly  picked  it  up.  "  Before  tea,  Mr.  Ben 
der?" 

"Before  everything,  Lady  Sandgate."  He  was  im 
mensely  genial,  but  a  queer,  quaint,  rough-edged  dis 
tinctness  somehow  kept  it  safe — for  himself. 

23 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Then  you've  come  to  do  business?"  Her  appeal 
and  her  emphasis  melted  as  into  a  caress — which,  how 
ever,  spent  itself  on  his  large  high  person  as  he  con 
sented,  with  less  of  demonstration  but  more  of  atten 
tion,  to  look  down  upon  her.  She  could  therefore  but 
reinforce  it  by  an  intenser  note.  "To  tell  me  you 
will  treat?" 

Mr.  Bender  had  six  feet  of  stature  and  an  air  as 
of  having  received  benefits  at  the  hands  of  fortune. 
Substantial,  powerful,  easy,  he  shone  as  with  a  glori 
ous  cleanness,  a  supplied  and  equipped  and  appointed 
sanity  and  security;  aids  to  action  that  might  have 
figured  a  pair  of  very  ample  wings — wide  pinions  for 
the  present  conveniently  folded,  but  that  he  would 
certainly  on  occasion  agitate  for  great  efforts  and 
spread  for  great  flights.  These  things  would  have 
made  him  quite  an  admirable,  even  a  worshipful, 
image  of  full-blown  life  and  character,  had  not  the 
affirmation  and  the  emphasis  halted  in  one  important 
particular.  Fortune,  felicity,  nature,  the  perverse  or 
interfering  old  fairy  at  his  cradle-side — whatever  the 
ministering  power  might  have  been — had  simply  over 
looked  and  neglected  his  vast  wholly-shaven  face, 
which  thus  showed  not  so  much  for  perfunctorily 
scamped  as  for  not  treated,  as  for  neither  formed  nor 
fondled  nor  finished,  at  all.  Nothing  seemed  to  have 
been  done  for  it  but  what  the  razor  and  the  sponge, 

24 


THE  OUTCRY 

the  tooth-brush  and  the  looking-glass  could  officiously 
do;  it  had  in  short  resisted  any  possibly  finer  attrition 
at  the  hands  of  fifty  years  of  offered  experience.  It 
had  developed  on  the  lines,  if  lines  they  could  be 
called,  of  the  mere  scoured  and  polished  and  initialled 
"mug"  rather  than  to  any  effect  of  a  composed 
physiognomy;  though  we  must  at  the  same  time  add 
that  its  wearer  carried  this  featureless  disk  as  with 
the  warranted  confidence  that  might  have  attended  a 
warning  headlight  or  a  glaring  motor-lamp.  The  ob 
ject,  however  one  named  it,  showed  you  at  least 
where  he  was,  and  most  often  that  he  was  straight 
upon  you.  It  was  fearlessly  and  resistingly  across 
the  path  of  his  advance  that  Lady  Sandgate  had 
thrown  herself,  and  indeed  with  such  success  that  he 
soon  connected  her  demonstration  with  a  particular 
motive.  "For  your  grandmother,  Lady  Sandgate?" 
he  then  returned. 

"For  my  grandmother's  mother,  Mr.  Bender — the 
most  beautiful  woman  of  her  time  and  the  greatest  of 
all  Lawrences,  no  matter  whose;  as  you  quite  ac 
knowledged,  you  know,  in  our  talk  in  Bruton  Street." 

Mr.  Bender  bethought  himself  further — yet  draw 
ing  it  out;  as  if  the  familiar  fact  of  his  being  "made 
up  to"  had  never  had  such  special  softness  and 
warmth  of  pressure.  "Do  you  want  very,  very 

much ?" 

25 


THE  OUTCRY 

She  had  already  caught  him  up.  "'Very,  very 
much'  for  her?  Well,  Mr.  Bender,"  she  smilingly 
replied,  "I  think  I  should  like  her  full  value." 

"I  mean" — he  kindly  discriminated — "do  you  want 
so  badly  to  work  her  off?" 

"It  would  be  an  intense  convenience  to  me — so 
much  so  that  your  telegram  made  me  at  once  fondly 
hope  you'd  be  arriving  to  conclude." 

Such  measure  of  response  as  he  had  good-naturedly 
given  her  was  the  mere  frayed  edge  of  a  mastering 
detachment,  the  copious,  impatient  range  elsewhere 
of  his  true  attention.  Somehow,  however,  he  still 
seemed  kind  even  while,  turning  his  back  upon  her, 
he  moved  off  to  look  at  one  of  the  several,  the  famous 
Dedborough  pictures — stray  specimens,  by  every  pre 
sumption,  lost  a  little  in  the  whole  bright  bigness. 
"' Conclude'  ?  "  he  echoed  as  he  approached  a  signifi 
cantly  small  canvas.  "You  ladies  want  to  get  there 
before  the  road's  so  much  as  laid  or  the  country's  safe! 
Do  you  know  what  this  here  is?"  he  at  once  went  on. 

"Oh,  you  can't  have  that!"  she  cried  as  with  full 
authority — "and  you  must  really  understand  that  you 
can't  have  everything.  You  mustn't  expect  to  ravage 
Dedborough." 

He  had  his  nose  meanwhile  close  to  the  picture.  "  I 
guess  it's  a  bogus  Cuyp — but  I  know  Lord  Theign 
has  things.  He  won't  do  business?" 

26 


THE  OUTCRY 

"He's  not  in  the  least,  and  can  never  be,  in  my 
tight  place,"  Lady  Sandgate  replied;  "but  he's  as 
proud  as  he's  kind,  dear  man,  and  as  solid  as  he's 
proud;  so  that  if  you  came  down  under  a  different 
impression — 1"  Well,  she  could  only  exhale  the  folly 
of  his  error  with  an  unction  that  represented,  what 
ever  he  might  think  of  it,  all  her  competence  to  answer 
for  their  host. 

He  scarce  thought  of  it  enough,  on  any  side,  how 
ever,  to  be  diverted  from  prior  dispositions.  "  I  came 
on  an  understanding  that  I  should  find  my  friend 
Lord  John,  and  that  Lord  Theign  would,  on  his  in 
troduction,  kindly  let  me  look  round.  But  being 
before  lunch  in  Bruton  Street  I  knocked  at  your 
door " 

"For  another  look,"  she  quickly  interposed,  "at 
my  Lawrence?" 

"For  another  look  at  you,  Lady  Sandgate — your 
great-grandmother  wasn't  required.  Informed  you 
were  here,  and  struck  with  the  coincidence  of  my 
being  myself  presently  due,"  he  went  on,  "  I  despatched 
you  my  wire,  on  coming  away,  just  to  keep  up  your 
spirits." 

"You  don't  keep  them  up,  you  depress  them  to 
anguish,"  she  almost  passionately  protested,  "when 
you  don't  tell  me  you'll  treat!" 

He  paused  in  his  preoccupation,  his  perambulation, 
27 


THE  OUTCRY 

conscious  evidently  of  no  reluctance  that  was  worth  a 
scene  with  so  charming  and  so  hungry  a  woman. 
"Well,  if  it's  a  question  of  your  otherwise  suffering 
torments,  may  I  have  another  interview  with  the  old 
lady?" 

"Dear  Mr.  Bender,  she's  in  the  flower  of  her  youth; 
she  only  yearns  for  interviews,  and  you  may  have," 
Lady  Sandgate  earnestly  declared,  "as  many  as  you 
like." 

"Oh,  you  must  be  there  to  protect  me!" 

"Then  as  soon  as  I  return !" 

"Well,"— it  clearly  cost  him  little  to  say— "I'll  come 
right  round." 

She  joyously  registered  the  vow.  "Only  mean 
while  then,  please,  never  a  word!" 

"  Never  a  word,  certainly.  But  where  all  this  time," 
Mr.  Bender  asked,  "is  Lord  John?" 

Lady  Sandgate,  as  he  spoke,  found  her  eyes  meet 
ing  those  of  a  young  woman  who,  presenting  herself 
from  without,  stood  framed  in  the  doorway  to  the  ter 
race;  a  slight  fair  grave  young  woman,  of  middle, 
stature  and  simply  dressed,  whose  brow  showed  clear 
even  under  the  heavy  shade  of  a  large  hat  surmounted 
with  big  black  bows  and  feathers.  Her  eyes  had 
vaguely  questioned  those  of  her  elder,  who  at  once  re 
plied  to  the  gentleman  forming  the  subject  of  their  in 
quiry:  "Lady  Grace  must  know."  At  this  the  young 

28 


THE  OUTCRY 

woman  came  forward,  and  Lady  Sandgate  introduced 
the  visitor.  "My  dear  Grace,  this  is  Mr.  Brecken- 
ridge  Bender." 

The  younger  daughter  of  the  house  might  have  ar 
rived  in  preoccupation,  but  she  had  urbanity  to  spare. 
"Of  whom  Lord  John  has  told  me,'*  she  returned, 
"and  whom  I'm  glad  to  see.  Lord  John,"  she  ex 
plained  to  his  waiting  friend,  "is  detained  a  moment 
in  the  park,  open  to-day  to  a  big  Temperance  school- 
feast,  where  our  party  is  mostly  gathered;  so  that  if 
you  care  to  go  out — !"  She  gave  him  in  fine  his  choice. 

But  this  was  clearly  a  thing  that,  in  the  conditions, 
Mr.  Bender  wasn't  the  man  to  take  precipitately; 
though  his  big  useful  smile  disguised  his  prudence. 
"Are  there  any  pictures  in  the  park?" 

Lady  Grace's  facial  response  represented  less  hu 
mour  perhaps,  but  more  play.  "We  find  our  park 
itself  rather  a  picture." 

Mr.  Bender's  own  levity  at  any  rate  persisted. 
"With  a  big  Temperance  school-feast?" 

"Mr.  Bender's  a  great  judge  of  pictures,"  Lady 
Sandgate  said  as  to  forestall  any  impression  of  exces 
sive  freedom. 

"Will  there  be  more  tea?"  he  pursued,  almost  pre 
suming  on  this. 

It  showed  Lady  Grace  for  comparatively  candid  and 
literal  "  Oh,  there'll  be  plenty  of  tea." 

29 


THE  OUTCRY 

This  appeared  to  determine  Mr.  Bender.  "Well, 
Lady  Grace,  I'm  after  pictures,  but  I  take  them 
'neat.'  May  I  go  right  round  here?" 

"Perhaps,  love,"  Lady  Sandgate  at  once  said, 
"you'll  let  me  show  him." 

"A  moment,  dear"— Lady  Grace  gently  demurred. 
"Do  go  round,"  she  conformably  added  to  Mr.  Ben 
der;  "take  your  ease  and  your  time.  Everything's 
open  and  visible,  and,  with  our  whole  company  dis 
persed,  you'll  have  the  place  to  yourself." 

He  rose,  in  his  genial  mass,  to  the  opportunity. 
"  I'll  be  in  clover — sure ! "  But  present  to  him  was  the 
richest  corner  of  the  pasture,  which  he  could  fluently 
enough  name.  "  And  I'll  find  '  The  Beautiful  Duchess 
of  Waterbridge'?" 

She  indicated,  off  to  the  right,  where  a  stately  per 
spective  opened,  the  quarter  of  the  saloon  to  which  we 
have  seen  Mr.  Banks  retire.  "At  the  very  end  of 
those  rooms." 

He  had  wide  eyes  for  the  vista.  "About  thirty  in  a 
row,  hey  ?  "  And  he  was  already  off.  "  I'll  work  right 
through!" 


THE  OUTCRY 

III 

LEFT  with  her  friend,  Lady  Grace  had  a  prompt 
question.  "Lord  John  warned  me  he  was  ' funny' — 
but  you  already  know  him?" 

There  might  have  been  a  sense  of  embarrassment 
in  the  way  in  which,  as  to  gain  time,  Lady  Sandgate 
pointed,  instead  of  answering,  to  the  small  picture 
pronounced  upon  by  Mr.  Bender.  "He  thinks  your 
little  Cuyp  a  fraud." 

"  That  one  ?  "  Lady  Grace  could  but  stare.  "  The 
wretch!"  However,  she  made,  without  alarm,  no 
more  of  it;  she  returned  to  her  previous  question. 
"You've  met  him  before?" 

"Just  a  little — in  town.  Being  'after  pictures,'  " 
Lady  Sandgate  explained,  "he  has  been  after  my 
great-grandmother. ' ' 

"She,"  said  Lady  Grace  with  amusement,  "must 
have  found  him  funny!  But  he  can  clearly  take  care 
of  himself,  while  Kitty  takes  care  of  Lord  John,  and 
while  you,  if  you'll  be  so  good,  go  back  to  support 
father — in  the  hour  of  his  triumph:  which  he  wants 
you  so  much  to  witness  that  he  complains  of  your  de 
sertion  and  goes  so  far  as  to  speak  of  you  as  sneaking 
away." 

Lady  Sandgate,  with  a  slight  flush,  turned  it  over. 
"I  delight  in  his  triumph,  and  whatever  I  do  is  at  least 


THE  OUTCRY 

above  board;  but  if  it's  a  question  of  support,  aren't 
you  yourself  failing  him  quite  as  much?" 

This  had,  however,  no  effect  on  the  girl's  confidence. 
"Ah,  my  dear,  I'm  not  at  all  the  same  thing,  and  as 
I'm  the  person  in  the  world  he  least  misses — "  Well, 
such  a  fact  spoke  for  itself. 

"You've  been  free  to  return  and  wait  for  Lord 
John?" — that  was  the  sense  in  which  the  elder  wom 
an  appeared  to  prefer  to  understand  it  as  speaking. 

The  tone  of  it,  none  the  less,  led  her  companion  im 
mediately,  though  very  quietly,  to  correct  her.  "I've 
not  come  back  to  wait  for  Lord  John." 

"Then  he  hasn't  told  you — if  you've  talked — with 
what  idea  he  has  come?" 

Lady  Grace  had  for  a  further  correction  the  same 
shade  of  detachment.  "Kitty  has  told  me — what  it 
suits  her  to  pretend  to  suppose." 

"And  Kitty's  pretensions  and  suppositions  always 
go  with  what  happens — at  the  moment,  among  all  her 
wonderful  happenings — to  suit  her?" 

Lady  Grace  let  that  question  answer  itself — she  took 
the  case  up  further  on.  "What  I  can't  make  out  is 
why  this  should  so  suit  her!" 

"And  what  /  can't!"  said  Lady  Sandgate  without 
gross  honesty  and  turning  away  after  having  watched 
the  girl  a  moment.  She  nevertheless  presently  faced 
her  again  to  follow  this  speculation  up.  "  Do  you  like 

32 


THE  OUTCRY 

• 

him  enough  to  risk  the  chance  of  Kitty's  being  for 
once  right?" 

Lady  Grace  gave  it  a  thought — with  which  she 
moved  away.  "I  don't  know  how  much  I  like  him!" 

"Nor  how  little!"  cried  her  friend,  who  evidently 
found  amusement  in  the  tone  of  it.  "And  you're  not 
disposed  to  take  the  time  to  find  out?  He's  at  least 
better  than  the  others." 

"The  'others'  ?"— Lady  Grace  was  blank  for  them. 

"The  others  of  his  set." 

"  Oh,  his  set!  That  wouldn't  be  difficult— by  what 
I  imagine  of  some  of  them.  But  he  means  well 
enough,"  the  girl  added;  "he's  very  charming  and 
does  me  great  honour." 

It  determined  in  her  companion,  about  to  leave 
her,  another  brief  arrest.  "Then  may  I  tell  your 
father?" 

This  in  turn  brought  about  in  Lady  Grace  an  im 
mediate  drop  of  the  subject.  "Tell  my  father  >  please, 
that  I'm  expecting  Mr.  Crimble;  of  whom  I've  spoken 
to  him  even  if  he  doesn't  remember,  and  who  bicycles 
this  afternoon  ten  miles  over  from  where  he's  staying — 
with  some  people  we  don't  know — to  look  at  the  pic 
tures,  about  which  he's  awfully  keen." 

Lady  Sandgate  took  it  in.     "  Ah,  like  Mr.  Bender  ?  " 

"No,  not  at  all,  I  think,  like  Mr.  Bender." 

This  appeared  to  move  in  the  elder  woman  some 
33 


THE  OUTCRY 

deeper  thought.     "May  I  ask  then — if  one's  to  meet 
him — who  he  is?" 

"Oh,  father  knows — or  ought  to — that  I  sat  next 
him,  in  London,  a  month  ago,  at  dinner,  and  that  he 
then  told  me  he  was  working,  tooth  and  nail,  at  what 
he  called  the  wonderful  modern  science  of  Connois- 
seurship — which  is  upsetting,  as  perhaps  you're  not 
aware,  all  the  old-fashioned  canons  of  art-criticism, 
everything  we've  stupidly  thought  right  and  held  dear; 
that  he  was  to  spend  Easter  in  these  parts,  and  that  he 
should  like  greatly  to  be  allowed  some  day  to  come 
over  and  make  acquaintance  with  our  things.  I  told 
him,"  Lady  Grace  wound  up,  "that  nothing  would  be 
easier;  a  note  from  him  arrived  before  dinner " 

Lady  Sandgate  jumped  the  rest.  "And  it's  for  him 
you've  come  in." 

"It's  for  him  I've  come  in,"  the  girl  assented  with 
serenity. 

"Very  good — though  he  sounds  most  detrimental! 
But  will  you  first  just  tell  me  this — whether  when  you 
sent  in  ten  minutes  ago  for  Lord  John  to  come  out  to 
you  it  was  wholly  of  your  own  movement?"  And 
she  followed  it  up  as  her  young  friend  appeared  to 
hesitate.  "Was  it  because  you  knew  why  he  had 
arrived?" 

The  young  friend  hesitated  still.     " '  Why '  ?  " 

"So  particularly  to  speak  to  you." 
34 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Since  he  was  expected  and  mightn't  know  where 
I  was/'  Lady  Grace  said  after  an  instant,  "  I  wanted 
naturally  to  be  civil  to  him." 

"And  had  he  time  there  to  tell  you,"  Lady  Sand- 
gate  asked,  "how  very  civil  he  wants  to  be  to  you?" 

"  No,  only  to  tell  me  that  his  friend — who's  off  there 
— was  coming;  for  Kitty  at  once  appropriated  him 
and  was  still  in  possession  when  I  came  away." 
Then,  as  deciding  at  last  on  perfect  frankness,  Lady 
Grace  went  on:  "If  you  want  to  know,  I  sent  for 
news  of  him  because  Kitty  insisted  on  my  doing  so; 
saying,  so  very  oddly  and  quite  in  her  own  way,  that 
she  herself  didn't  wish  to l  appear  in  it.J  She  had  done 
nothing  but  say  to  me  for  an  hour,  rather  worryingly, 
what  you've  just  said — that  it's  me  he's  what,  like 
Mr.  Bender,  she  calls  *  after';  but  as  soon  as  he  ap 
peared  she  pounced  on  him,  and  I  left  him — I  assure 
you  quite  resignedly — in  her  hands." 

"She  wants" — it  was  easy  for  Lady  Sandgate  to 
remark — "to  talk  of  you  to  him." 

"I  don't  know  what  she  wants,"  the  girl  replied  as 
with  rather  a  tired  patience;  "Kitty  wants  so  many 
things  at  once.  She  always  wants  money,  in  quanti 
ties,  to  begin  with — and  all  to  throw  so  horribly  away; 
so  that  whenever  I  see  her  '  in '  so  very  deep  with  any 
one  I  always  imagine  her  appealing  for  some  new  tip 
as  to  how  it's  to  be  come  by." 

35 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Kitty's  an  abyss,  I  grant  you,  and  with  my  dis 
interested  devotion  to  your  father — in  requital  of  all 
his  kindness  to  me  since  Lord  Sandgate's  death  and 
since  your  mother's — I  can  never  be  too  grateful  to 
you,  my  dear,  for  your  being  so  different  a  creature. 
But  what  is  she  going  to  gain  financially,"  Lady  Sand- 
gate  pursued  with  a  strong  emphasis  on  her  adverb, 
"  by  working  up  our  friend's  confidence  in  your  listen 
ing  to  him — if  you  are  to  listen?" 

"I  haven't  in  the  least  engaged  to  listen,"  said  Lady 
Grace — "it  will  depend  on  the  music  he  makes!" 
But  she  added  with  light  cynicism:  "Perhaps  she's  to 
gain  a  commission!" 

"On  his  fairly  getting  you?"  And  then  as  the  girl 
assented  by  silence:  "Is  he  in  a  position  to  pay  her 
one?"  Lady  Sandgate  asked. 

"I  dare  say  the  Duchess  is!" 

"But  do  you  see  the  Duchess  producing  money — 
with  all  that  Kitty,  as  we're  not  ignorant,  owes  her? 
Hundreds  and  hundreds  and  hundreds!" — Lady 
Sandgate  piled  them  up. 

Her  young  friend's  gesture  checked  it.  "  Ah,  don't 
tell  me  how  many — it's  too  sad  and  too  ugly  and  too 
wrong!"  To  which,  however,  Lady  Grace  added: 
"But  perhaps  that  will  be  just  her  way!"  And  then 
as  her  companion  seemed  for  the  moment  not  quite  to 
follow:  "By  letting  Kitty  off  her  debt." 

36 


THE  OUTCRY 

"You  mean  that  Kitty  goes  free  if  Lord  John  wins 
your  promise?" 

"Kitty  goes  free." 

"She  has  her  creditor's  release?" 

"For  every  shilling." 

"And  if  he  only  fails?" 

"  Why  then  of  course,"  said  now  quite  lucid  Lady 
Grace,  "she  throws  herself  more  than  ever  on  poor 
father." 

"Poor  father  indeed!"  —  Lady  Sandgate  richly 
sighed  it. 

It  appeared  even  to  create  in  the  younger  woman  a 
sense  of  excess.  "  Yes — but  he  after  all  and  in  spite 
of  everything  adores  her." 

"To  the  point,  you  mean" — for  Lady  Sandgate 
could  clearly  but  wonder — "of  really  sacrificing  you ?" 

The  weight  of  Lady  Grace's  charming  deep  eyes  on 
her  face  made  her  pause  while,  at  some  length,  she 
gave  back  this  look  and  the  interchange  determined 
in  the  girl  a  grave  appeal.  "You  think  I  should  be 
sacrificed  if  I  married  him?" 

Lady  Sandgate  replied,  though  with  an  equal  em 
phasis,  indirectly.  "Could  you  marry  him?" 

Lady  Grace  waited  a  moment.  "  Do  you  mean  for 
Kitty?" 

"For  himself  even — if  they  should  convince  you, 
among  them,  that  he  cares  for  you." 

37 


THE  OUTCRY 

Lady  Grace  had  another  delay.  "Well,  he's  his 
awful  mother's  son." 

"Yes — but  you  wouldn't  marry  his  mother." 

"No — but  I  should  only  be  the  more  uncomfort 
ably  and  intimately  conscious  of  her." 

"  Even  when,"  Lady  Sandgate  optimistically  put  it, 
"she  so  markedly  likes  you?" 

This  determined  in  the  girl  a  fine  impatience. 
"She  doesn't  'like'  me,  she  only  wants  me — which  is 
a  very  different  thing;  wants  me  for  my  father's  so 
particularly  beautiful  position,  and  my  mother's  so 
supremely  great  people,  and  for  everything  we  have 
been  and  have  done,  and  still  are  and  still  have:  ex 
cept  of  course  poor  not-at-all-model  Kitty." 

To  this  luminous  account  of  the  matter  Lady  Sand- 
gate  turned  as  to  a  genial  sun-burst.  "  I  see  indeed — 
for  the  general  immaculate  connection." 

The  words  had  no  note  of  irony,  but  Lady  Grace, 
in  her  great  seriousness,  glanced  with  deprecation  at 
the  possibility.  "Well,  we  haven '/  had  false  notes. 
We've  scarcely  even  had  bad  moments." 

"Yes,  you've  been  beatific!" — Lady  Sandgate  en 
viously,  quite  ruefully,  felt  it.  But  any  further  treat 
ment  of  the  question  was  checked  by  the  re-entrance 
of  the  footman — a  demonstration  explained  by  the 
concomitant  appearance  of  a  young  man  in  eye 
glasses  and  with  the  ends  of  his  trousers  clipped  to- 

38 


THE  OUTCRY 

gether  as  for  cycling.  "This  must  be  your  friend," 
she  had  only  time  to  say  to  the  daughter  of  the  house; 
with  which,  alert  and  reminded  of  how  she  was  awaited 
elsewhere,  she  retreated  before  her  companion's  vis 
itor,  who  had  come  in  with  his  guide  from  the  vestibule. 
She  passed  away  to  the  terrace  and  the  gardens,  Mr. 
Hugh  Crimble's  announced  name  ringing  in  her  ears 
— to  some  effect  that  we  are  as  yet  not  qualified  to 
discern. 

IV 

LADY  GRACE  had  turned  to  meet  Mr.  Hugh  Crimble, 
whose  pleasure  in  at  once  finding  her  lighted  his  keen 
countenance  and  broke  into  easy  words.  "  So  awfully 
kind  of  you — in  the  midst  of  the  great  doings  I  no 
ticed — to  have  found  a  beautiful  minute  for  me." 

"I  left  the  great  doings,  which  are  almost  over,  to 
every  one's  relief,  I  think,"  the  girl  returned,  "so  that 
your  precious  time  shouldn't  be  taken  to  hunt  for 
me." 

It  was  clearly  for  him,  on  this  bright  answer,  as  if 
her  white  hand  were  holding  out  the  perfect  flower  of 
felicity.  "You  came  in  from  your  revels  on  purpose 
— with  the  same  charity  you  showed  me  from  that  first 
moment?"  They  stood  smiling  at  each  other  as  in 
an  exchange  of  sympathy  already  confessed — and  even 
as  if  finding  that  their  relation  had  grown  during  the 

39 


THE  OUTCRY 

lapse  of  contact;  she  recognising  the  effect  of  what 
they  had  originally  felt  as  bravely  as  he  might  name  it. 
What  the  fine,  slightly  long  oval  of  her  essentially 
quiet  face — quiet  in  spite  of  certain  vague  depths  of 
reference  to  forces  of  the  strong  high  order,  forces 
involved  and  implanted,  yet  also  rather  spent  in  the 
process — kept  in  range  from  under  her  redundant 
black  hat  was  the  strength  of  expression,  the  direct 
ness  of  communication,  that  her  guest  appeared  to 
borrow  from  the  unframed  and  unattached  nippers  un 
ceasingly  perched,  by  their  mere  ground-glass  rims,  as 
she  remembered,  on  the  bony  bridge  of  his  indescriba 
bly  authoritative  (since  it  was  at  the  same  time  de 
cidedly  inquisitive)  young  nose.  She  must,  however, 
also  have  embraced  in  this  contemplation,  she  must 
more  or  less  again  have  interpreted,  his  main  physiog 
nomic  mark,  the  degree  to  which  his  clean  jaw  was 
underhung  and  his  lower  lip  protruded;  a  lapse  of 
regularity  made  evident  by  a  suppression  of  beard  and 
moustache  as  complete  as  that  practised  by  Mr.  Ben 
der — though  without  the  appearance  consequent  in 
the  latter's  case,  that  of  the  flagrantly  vain  appeal  in 
the  countenance  for  some  other  exhibition  of  a  history, 
of  a  process  of  production,  than  this  so  superficial  one. 
With  the  interested  and  interesting  girl  sufficiently 
under  our  attention  while  we  thus  try  to  evoke  her, 
we  may  even  make  out  some  wonder  in  her  as  to  why 

40 


THE  OUTCRY 

the  so  perceptibly  protrusive  lower  lip  of  this  acquaint 
ance  of  an  hour  or  two  should  positively  have  contrib 
uted  to  his  being  handsome  instead  of  much  more  log 
ically  interfering  with  it.  We  might  in  fact  in  such  a 
case  even  have  followed  her  into  another  and  no  less 
refined  a  speculation — the  question  of  whether  the 
surest  seat  of  his  good  looks  mightn't  after  all  be  his 
high,  fair,  if  somewhat  narrow,  forehead,  crowned 
with  short  crisp  brown  hair  and  which,  after  a  fashion 
of  its  own,  predominated  without  overhanging.  He 
spoke  after  they  had  stood  just  face  to  face  almost 
long  enough  for  awkwardness.  "I  haven't  forgotten 
one  item  of  your  kindness  to  me  on  that  rather  bleak 
occasion." 

"Bleak  do  you  call  it?"  she  laughed.  "Why  I 
found  it,  rather,  tropical — 'lush.'  My  neighbour  on 
the  other  side  wanted  to  talk  to  me  of  the  White  City." 

"Then  you  made  it  doubtless  bleak  for  him,  let 
us  say.  /  couldn't  let  you  alone,  I  remember,  about 
this — it  was  like  a  shipwrecked  signal  to  a  sail  on  the 
horizon."  "This"  obviously  meant  for  the  young 
man  exactly  what  surrounded  him;  he  had  begun,  like 
Mr.  Bender,  to  be  conscious  of  a  thick  solicitation  of 
the  eye — and  much  more  than  he,  doubtless,  of  a  tug 
at  the  imagination;  and  he  broke — characteristically, 
you  would  have  been  sure — into  a  great  free  gaiety  of 
recognition. 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Oh,  we've  nothing  particular  in  the  hall,"  Lady 
Grace  amiably  objected. 

"  Nothing,  I  see,  but  Claudes  and  Cuyps!  I'm  an 
ogre,"  he  said — "before  a  new  and  rare  feast!" 

She  happily  took  up  his  figure.  "Then  won't  you 
begin — as  a  first  course — with  tea  after  your  ride? 
If  the  other,  that  is — for  there  has  been  an  ogre  before 
you — has  left  any." 

"Some  tea,  with  pleasure" — he  looked  all  his  long 
ing;  "though  when  you  talk  of  a  fellow-f caster  I 
should  have  supposed  that,  on  such  a  day  as  this  es 
pecially,  you'd  find  yourselves  running  a  continuous 
table  d'hote." 

"Ah,  we  can't  work  sports  in  our  gallery  and  saloon 
— the  banging  or  whacking  and  shoving  amusements 
that  are  all  most  people  care  for;  unless,  perhaps," 
Lady  Grace  went  on,  "your  own  peculiar  one,  as  I  un 
derstand  you,  of  playing  football  with  the  old  benighted 
traditions  and  attributions  you  everywhere  meet:  in 
fact  I  think  you  said  the  old  idiotic  superstitions." 

Hugh  Crimble  went  more  than  half-way  to  meet  this 
description  of  his  fondest  activity;  he  indeed  even 
beckoned  it  on.  "  The  names  and  stories  and  styles — 
the  so  often  vain  legend,  not  to  be  too  invidious — of 
author  or  subject  or  school  ?"  But  he  had  a  drop,  no 
less,  as  from  the  sense  of  a  cause  sometimes  lost. 
"Ah,  that's  a  game  at  which  we  all  can  play!" 

42 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Though  scarcely,"  Lady  Grace  suggested,  "at 
which  we  all  can  score." 

The  words  appeared  indeed  to  take  meaning  from 
his  growing  impression  of  the  place  and  its  charm — 
of  the  number  of  objects,  treasures  of  art,  that  pressed 
for  appreciation  of  their  importance.  "Certainly," 
he  said,  "  no  one  can  ever  have  scored  much  on  sacred 
spots  of  this  order — which  express  so  the  grand  im 
punity  of  their  pride,  their  claims,  their  assurance!" 

"We've  had  great  luck,"  she  granted — "as  I've  just 
been  reminded;  but  ever  since  those  terrible  things  you 
told  me  in  town — about  the  tremendous  tricks  of  the 
whirligig  of  time  and  the  aesthetic  fools'  paradise  in 
which  so  many  of  us  live — I've  gone  about  with  my 
heart  in  my  mouth.  Who  knows  that  while  I  talk 
Mr.  Bender  mayn't  be  pulling  us  to  pieces?" 

Hugh  Crimble  had  a  shudder  of  remembrance. 
"Mr.  Bender?" 

"The  rich  American  who's  going  round." 

It  gave  him  a  sharper  shock.  "The  wretch  who 
bagged  Lady  Lappington's  Longhi?" 

Lady  Grace  showed  surprise.     "  Is  he  a  wretch  ?  " 

Her  visitor  but  asked  to  be  extravagant.  "  Rather 
— the  scoundrel.  He  offered  his  infernal  eight  thou 
sand  down." 

"Oh,  I  thought  you  meant  he  had  played  some 
trick!" 

43 


THE  OUTCRY 

"I  wish  he  had — he  could  then  have  been  collared." 

"  Well,"  Lady  Grace  peacefully  smiled,  "  it's  no  use 
his  offering  us  eight  thousand — or  eighteen  or  even 
eighty!" 

Hugh  Crimble  stared  as  at  the  odd  superfluity  of  this 
reassurance,  almost  crude  on  exquisite  lips  and  con 
tradicting  an  imputation  no  one  would  have  indecently 
made.  "Gracious  goodness,  I  hope  not!  The  man 
surely  doesn't  suppose  you'd  traffic." 

She  might,  while  she  still  smiled  at  him,  have  been 
fairly  enjoying  the  friendly  horror  she  produced.  "I 
don't  quite  know  what  he  supposes.  But  people  have 
trafficked;  people  do;  people  are  trafficking  all  round." 

"Ah,"  Hugh  Crimble  cried,  "that's  what  deprives 
me  of  my  rest  and,  as  a  lover  of  our  vast  and  beneficent 
art-wealth,  poisons  my  waking  hours.  That  art- 
wealth  is  at  the  mercy  of  a  leak  there  appears  no  means 
of  stopping."  She  had  tapped  a  spring  in  him,  clearly, 
and  the  consequent  flood  might  almost  at  any  moment 
become  copious.  "  Precious  things  are  going  out  of 
our  distracted  country  at  a  quicker  rate  than  the  very 
quickest — a  century  and  more  ago — of  their  ever  com 
ing  in." 

She  was  sharply  struck,  but  was  also  unmistakably 
a  person  in  whom  stirred  thought  soon  found  connec 
tions  and  relations.  "  Well,  I  suppose  our  art- wealth 
came  in — save  for  those  awkward  Elgin  Marbles! — 

44 


THE  OUTCRY 

mainly  by  purchase  too,  didn't  it?  We  ourselves 
largely  took  it  away  from  somewhere,  didn't  we?  We 
didn't  grow  it  all." 

"  We  grew  some  of  the  loveliest  flowers — and  on  the 
whole  to-day  the  most  exposed."  He  had  been  pulled 
up  but  for  an  instant.  "Great  Gainsboroughs  and 
Sir  Joshuas  and  Romneys  and  Sargents,  great  Turn 
ers  and  Constables  and  old  Cromes  and  Brabazons, 
form,  you'll  recognise,  a  vast  garden  in  themselves. 
What  have  we  ever  for  instance  more  successfully 
grown  than  your  splendid  'Duchess  of  Waterbridge '  ? " 

The  girl  showed  herself  ready  at  once  to  recognise 
under  his  eloquence  anything  he  would.  "Yes — it's 
our  Sir  Joshua,  I  believe,  that  Mr.  Bender  has  pro 
claimed  himself  particularly  'after.'  " 

It  brought  a  cloud  to  her  friend's  face.  "Then  he'll 
be  capable  of  anything." 

"Of  anything,  no  doubt,  but  of  making  my  father 
capable — !  And  you  haven't  at  any  rate,"  she  said, 
"so  much  as  seen  the  picture." 

"I  beg  your  pardon — I  saw  it  at  the  Guildhall  three 
years  ago;  and  am  almost  afraid  of  getting  again,  with 
a  fresh  sense  of  its  beauty,  a  livelier  sense  of  its  danger." 

Lady  Grace,  however,  was  so  far  from  fear  that  she 
could  even  afford  pity.  "Poor  baffled  Mr.  Bender!" 

"Oh,  rich  and  confident  Mr.  Bender!"  Crimble 
cried.  "Once  given  his  money,  his  confidence  is  a 

45 


THE  OUTCRY 

horrid  engine  in  itself — there's  the  rub!  I  dare  say" 
— the  young  man  saw  it  all — "he  has  brought  his 
poisonous  cheque." 

She  gave  it  her  less  exasperated  wonder.  "  One  has 
heard  of  that,  but  only  in  the  case  of  some  particularly 
pushing  dealer." 

"And  Mr.  Bender,  to  do  him  justice,  isn't  a  particu 
larly  pushing  dealer?" 

"No,"  Lady  Grace  judiciously  returned;  "I  think 
he's  not  a  dealer  at  all,  but  just  what  you  a  moment 
ago  spoke  of  yourself  as  being." 

He  gave  a  glance  at  his  possibly  wild  recent  past. 
"A  fond  true  lover?" 

"As  we  all  were  in  our  lucky  time — when  we  rum- 
aged  Italy  and  Spain." 

He  appeared  to  recognise  this  complication — of 
Bender's  voracious  integrity;  but  only  to  push  it  away. 
"Well,  I  don't  know  whether  the  best  lovers  are,  or 
ever  were,  the  best  buyers — but  I  feel  to-day  that 
they're  the  best  keepers." 

The  breath  of  his  emphasis  blew,  as  her  eyes  showed, 
on  the  girl's  dimmer  fire.  "  It's  as  if  it  were  suddenly 
in  the  air  that  you've  brought  us  some  light  or  some 
help — that  you  may  do  something  really  good  for  us." 

"Do  you  mean  'mark  down,'  as  they  say  at  the 
shops,  all  your  greatest  claims  ?  " 

His  chord  of  sensibility  had  trembled  all  gratefully 
46 


THE  OUTCRY 

into  derision,  and  not  to  seem  to  swagger  he  had  put 
his  possible  virtue  at  its  lowest.  This  she  beautifully 
showed  that  she  beautifully  saw.  "I  dare  say  that  if 
you  did  even  that  we  should  have  to  take  it  from  you." 

"Then  it  may  very  well  be,"  he  laughed  back,  "the 
reason  why  I  feel,  under  my  delightful,  wonderful  im 
pression,  a  bit  anxious  and  nervous  and  afraid." 

"That  shows,"  she  returned,  "that  you  suspect  us  of 
horrors  hiding  from  justice,  and  that  your  natural 
kindness  yet  shrinks  from  handing  us  over!" 

Well,  clearly,  she  might  put  it  as  she  liked — it  all 
came  back  to  his  being  more  charmed.  "Heaven 
knows  I've  wanted  a  chance  at  you,  but  what  should 
you  say  if,  having  then  at  last  just  taken  you  in  in  your 
so  apparent  perfection,  I  should  feel  it  the  better  part 
of  valour  simply  to  mount  my  'bike'  again  and  spin 
away?" 

"  I  should  be  sure  that  at  the  end  of  the  avenue  you'd 
turn  right  round  and  come  back.  You'd  think  again 
of  Mr.  Bender." 

"  Whom  I  don't,  however,  you  see — if  he's  prowling 
off  there — in  the  least  want  to  meet."  Crimble  made 
the  point  with  gaiety.  "I  don't  know  what  I  mightn't 
do  to  him — and  yet  it's  not  of  my  temptation  to  vio 
lence,  after  all,  that  I'm  most  afraid.  It's  of  the  brutal 
mistake  of  one's  breaking — with  one's  priggish,  pre 
cious  modernity  and  one's  possibly  futile  discriminations 

47 


THE  OUTCRY 

— into  a  general  situation  or  composition,  as  we  say,  so 
serene  and  sound  and  right.  What  should  one  do  here, 
out  of  respect  for  that  felicity,  but  hold  one's  breath 
and  walk  on  tip-toe  ?  The  very  celebrations  and  con 
secrations,  as  you  tell  me,  instinctively  stay  outside. 
I  saw  that  all,"  the  young  man  went  on  with  more 
weight  in  his  ardour,  "I  saw  it,  while  we  talked  in 
London,  as  your  natural  setting  and  your  native  air — 
and  now  ten  minutes  on  the  spot  have  made  it  sink  in 
to  my  spirit.  You're  a  case,  all  together,  of  enchanted 
harmony,  of  perfect  equilibrium — there's  nothing  to 
be  done  or  said." 

His  friend  listened  to  this  eloquence  with  her  eyes 
lowered,  then  raising  them  to  meet,  with  a  vague  in 
sistence,  his  own;  after  which  something  she  had  seen 
there  appeared  to  determine  in  her  another  motion. 
She  indicated  the  small  landscape  that  Mr.  Bender  had, 
by  Lady  Sandgate's  report,  rapidly  studied  and  de 
nounced.  "  For  what  do  you  take  that  little  picture  ?  " 

Hugh  Crimble  went  over  and  looked.  "Why,  don't 
you  know?  It's  a  jolly  little  Vandermeer  of  Delft." 

"It's  not  a  base  imitation?" 

He  looked  again,  but  appeared  at  a  loss.  "An  imi 
tation  of  Vandermeer?" 

"Mr.  Bender  thinks  of  Cuyp." 

It  made  the  young  man  ring  out:  "Then  Mr.  Ben 
der's  doubly  dangerous!" 

48 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Singly  is  enough!"  Lady  Grace  laughed.  "But 
you  see  you  have  to  speak." 

"Oh,  to  him,  rather,  after  that — if  you'll  just  take 
me  to  him." 

"Yes  then,"  she  said;  but  even  while  she  spoke 
Lord  John,  who  had  returned,  by  the  terrace,  from  his 
quarter  of  an  hour  passed  with  Lady  Imber,  was  there 
practically  between  them;  a  fact  that  she  had  to  notice 
for  her  other  visitor,  to  whom  she  was  hastily  reduced 
to  naming  him. 

His  lordship  eagerly  made  the  most  of  this  tribute 
of  her  attention,  which  had  reached  his  ear;  he  treated 
it — her  "Oh  Lord  John!" — as  a  direct  greeting.  "Ah 
Lady  Grace!  I  came  back  particularly  to  find  you." 

She  could  but  explain  her  predicament.  "I  was 
taking  Mr.  Crimble  to  see  the  pictures."  And  then 
more  pointedly,  as  her  manner  had  been  virtually  an 
introduction  of  that  gentleman,  an  introduction  which 
Lord  John's  mere  noncommittal  stare  was  as  little  as 
possible  a  response  to:  "Mr.  Crimble's  one  of  the 
quite  new  connoisseurs." 

"Oh,  I'm  at  the  very  lowest  round  of  the  ladder. 
But  I  aspire!"  Hugh  laughed. 

"You'll  mount!"  said  Lady  Grace  with  friendly  con 
fidence. 

He  took  it  again  with  gay  deprecation.  "Ah,  if  by 
that  time  there's  anything  left  here  to  mount  on!11 

49 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Let  us  hope  there  will  be  at  least  what  Mr.  Ben 
der,  poor  man,  won't  have  been  able  to  carry  off." 
To  which  Lady  Grace  added,  as  to  strike  a  helpful 
spark  from  the  personage  who  had  just  joined  them, 
but  who  had  the  air  of  wishing  to  preserve  his  detach 
ment:  "It's  to  Lord  John  that  we  owe  Mr.  Ben 
der's  acquaintance." 

Hugh  looked  at  the  gentleman  to  whom  they  were 
so  indebted.  "Then  do  you  happen  to  know,  sir, 
what  your  friend  means  to  do  with  his  spoil?" 

The  question  got  itself  but  dryly  treated,  as  if  it 
might  be  a  commercially  calculating  or  interested  one. 
"  Oh,  not  sell  it  again." 

"Then  ship  it  to  New  York?"  the  inquirer  pursued, 
defining  himself  somehow  as  not  snubbed  and,  from 
this  point,  not  snubbable. 

That  appearance  failed  none  the  less  to  deprive 
Lord  John  of  a  betrayed  relish  for  being  able  to  dis 
please  Lady  Grace's  odd  guest  by  large  assent.  "As 
fast  as  ever  he  can — and  you  can  land  things  there 
now,  can't  you  ?  in  three  or  four  days." 

"I  dare  say.  But  can't  he  be  induced  to  have  a  lit 
tle  mercy?"  Hugh  sturdily  pursued. 

Lord  John  pushed  out  his  lips.  "  A  '  little '  ?  How 
much  do  you  want?" 

"Well,  one  wants  to  be  able  somehow  to  stay  his 
hand." 


THE  OUTCRY 

"I  doubt  if  you  can  any  more  stay  Mr.  Bender's 
hand  than  you  can  empty  his  purse." 

"Ah,  the  Despoilers!"  said  Crimble  with  strong  ex 
pression.  "But  it's  we,"  he  added,  "who  are  base." 

"'Base'?" — and  Lord  John's  surprise  was  appar 
ently  genuine. 

"To  want  only  to  'do  business,'  I  mean,  with  our 
treasures,  with  our  glories." 

Hugh's  words  exhaled  such  a  sense  of  peril  as  to 
draw  at  once  Lady  Grace.  "Ah,  but  if  we're  above 
that  here,  as  you  know !" 

He  stood  smilingly  corrected  and  contrite.  "Of 
course  I  know — but  you  must  forgive  me  if  I  have  it 
on  the  brain.  And  show  me  first  of  all,  won't  you? 
the  Moretto  of  Brescia. " 

"  You  know  then  about  the  Moretto  of  Brescia  ?  " 

"Why,  didn't  you  tell  me  yourself?"  It  went  on 
between  them  for  the  moment  quite  as  if  there  had 
been  no  Lord  John. 

" Probably,  yes,"  she  recalled;  "so  how  I  must  have 
swaggered!"  After  which  she  turned  to  the  other 
visitor  with  a  kindness  strained  clear  of  urgency. 
"Will  you  also  come?" 

He  confessed  to  a  difficulty — which  his  whole  face 
begged  her  also  to  take  account  of.  "I  hoped  you'd 
be  at  leisure — for  something  I've  so  at  heart!" 

This  had  its  effect;   she  took  a  rapid  decision  and 


THE  OUTCRY 

turned  persuasively  to  Crimble — for  whom,  in  like 
manner,  there  must  have  been  something  in  her  face. 
"  Let  Mr.  Bender  himself  then  show  you.  And  there 
are  things  in  the  library  too." 

"Oh  yes,  there  are  things  in  the  library."  Lord 
John,  happy  in  his  gained  advantage  and  addressing 
Hugh  from  the  strong  ground  of  an  initiation  already 
complete,  quite  sped  him  on  the  way. 

Hugh  clearly  made  no  attempt  to  veil  the  penetra 
tion  with  which  he  was  moved  to  look  from  one  of  these 
counsellors  to  the  other,  though  with  a  ready  "Thank- 
you!"  for  Lady  Grace  he  the  next  instant  started  in 
pursuit  of  Mr.  Bender. 


"YouR  friend  seems  remarkably  hot!"  Lord  John 
remarked  to  his  young  hostess  as  soon  as  they  had 
been  left  together. 

"He  has  cycled  twenty  miles.  And  indeed,"  she 
smiled,  "he  does  appear  to  care  for  what  he  cares  for!" 

Her  companion  then,  during  a  moment's  silence, 
might  have  been  noting  the  emphasis  of  her  assent. 
"Have  you  known  him  long?" 

"No— not  long." 

"Nor  seen  him  often?" 

"  Only  once — till  now." 
52 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Oh!"  said  Lord  John  with  another  pause.  But 
he  soon  proceeded.  "Let  us  leave  him  then  to  cool! 
I  haven't  cycled  twenty  miles,  but  I've  motored  forty 
very  much  in  the  hope  of  this,  Lady  Grace — the  chance 
of  being  able  to  assure  you  that  I  too  care  very  much 
for  what  I  care  for."  To  which  he  added  on  an  easier 
note,  as  to  carry  off  a  slight  awkwardness  while  she 
only  waited:  "You  certainly  mustn't  let  yourself — 
between  us  all — be  worked  to  death." 

"  Oh,  such  days  as  this — !"  She  made  light  enough 
of  her  burden. 

"They  don't  come  often  to  me  at  least,  Lady  Grace! 
I  hadn't  grasped  in  advance  the  scale  of  your  fete," 
he  went  on;  "but  since  I've  the  great  luck  to  find  you 
alone — !"  He  paused  for  breath,  however,  before 
the  full  sequence. 

She  helped  him  out  as  through  common  kindness, 
but  it  was  a  trifle  colourless.  "Alone  or  in  company, 
Lord  John,  I'm  always  very  glad  to  see  you." 

"Then  that  assurance  helps  me  to  wonder  if  you 
don't  perhaps  gently  guess  what  it  is  I  want  to  say." 
This  time  indeed  she  left  him  to  his  wonder,  so  that  he 
had  to  support  himself.  "I've  tried,  all  considerately 
— these  three  months — to  let  you  see  for  yourself  how 
I  feel.  I  feel  very  strongly,  Lady  Grace;  so  that  at 
last" — and  his  impatient  sincerity  took  after  another 
instant  the  jump — "well,  I  regularly  worship  you. 

S3 


THE  OUTCRY 

You're  my  absolute  ideal.     I  think  of  you  the  whole 
time." 

She  measured  out  consideration  as  if  it  had  been  a 
yard  of  pretty  ribbon.  "Are  you  sure  you  know  me 
enough ?" 

"I  think  I  know  a  perfect  woman  when  I  see  one!" 
Nothing  now  at  least  could  have  been  more  prompt, 
and  while  a  decent  pity  for  such  a  mistake  showed  in 
her  smile  he  followed  it  up.  "  Isn't  what  you  rather 
mean  that  you  haven't  cared  sufficiently  to  know  me? 
If  so,  that  can  be  little  by  little  mended,  Lady  Grace." 
He  was  in  fact  altogether  gallant  about  it.  "I'm 
aware  of  the  limits  of  what  I  have  to  show  or  to 
offer,  but  I  defy  you  to  find  a  limit  to  my  possible 
devotion." 

She  deferred  to  that,  but  taking  it  in  a  lower  key. 
"I  believe  you'd  be  very  good  to  me." 

"Well,  isn't  that  something  to  start  with?"— he  fair 
ly  pounced  on  it.  "I'll  do  any  blest  thing  in  life  you 
like,  I'll  accept  any  condition  you  impose,  if  you'll 
only  tell  me  you  see  your  way." 

"Shouldn't  I  have  a  little  more  first  to  see  yours?" 
she  asked.  "When  you  say  you'll  do  anything  in  life 
I  like,  isn't  there  anything  you  yourself  want  strongly 
enough  to  do?" 

He  cast  a  stare  about  on  the  suggestions  of  the  scene. 
"Anything  that  will  make  money,  you  mean?" 

54 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Make  money  or  make  reputation — or  even  just 
make  the  time  pass." 

"  Oh,  what  I  have  to  look  to  in  the  way  of  a  career  ?  " 
If  that  was  her  meaning  he  could  show  after  an  instant 
that  he  didn't  fear  it.  "Well,  your  father,  dear  de 
lightful  man,  has  been  so  good  as  to  give  me  to  under 
stand  that  he  backs  me  for  a  decent  deserving  crea 
ture;  and  I've  noticed,  as  you  doubtless  yourself  have, 
that  when  Lord  Theign  backs  a  fellow !" 

He  left  the  obvious  moral  for  her  to  take  up — which 
she  did,  but  all  interrogatively.  "  The  fellow  at  once 
comes  in  for  something  awfully  good?" 

"I  don't  in  the  least  mind  your  laughing  at  me," 
Lord  John  returned,  "  for  when  I  put  him  the  question 
of  the  lift  he'd  give  me  by  speaking  to  you  first  he  bade 
me  simply  remember  the  complete  personal  liberty  in 
which  he  leaves  you,  and  yet  which  doesn't  come — take 
my  word!"  said  the  young  man  sagely — "from  his 
being  at  all  indifferent." 

"No,"  she  answered — "father  isn't  indifferent.  But 
father's  'great.'  " 

"Great  indeed!"— her  friend  took  it  as  with  full 
comprehension.  This  appeared  not  to  prevent,  how 
ever,  a  second  and  more  anxious  thought.  "  Too  great 
for  you?" 

"Well,  he  makes  me  feel — even  as  his  daughter — 
my  extreme  comparative  smallness." 

55 


THE  OUTCRY 

It  was  easy,  Lord  John  indicated,  to  see  what  she 
meant.  "  He's  a  grand  seigneur,  and  a  serious  one — 
that's  what  he  is:  the  very  type  and  model  of  it,  down 
to  the  ground.  So  you  can  imagine,"  the  young  man 
said,  "what  he  makes  me  feel — most  of  all  when  he's 
so  awfully  good-natured  to  me.  His  being  as  'great* 
as  you  say  and  yet  backing  me— such  as  I  am! — 
doesn't  that  strike  you  as  a  good  note  for  me,  the  best 
you  could  possibly  require  ?  For  he  really  would  like 
what  I  propose  to  you." 

She  might  have  been  noting,  while  she  thought,  that 
he  had  risen  to  ingenuity,  to  fineness,  on  the  wings  of 
his  argument;  under  the  effect  of  which  her  reply  had 
the  air  of  a  concession.  "Yes — he  would  like  it." 

"Then  he  has  spoken  to  you?"  her  suitor  eagerly 
asked. 

"He  hasn't  needed — he  has  ways  of  letting  one 
know." 

"Yes,  yes,  he  has  ways;  all  his  own — like  every 
thing  else  he  has.  He's  wonderful." 

She  fully  agreed.     "He's  wonderful." 

The  tone  of  it  appeared  somehow  to  shorten  at  once 
for  Lord  John  the  rest  of  his  approach  to  a  conclusion. 
"So  you  do  see  your  way?" 

"Ah — !"  she  said  with  a  quick  sad  shrinkage. 

"I  mean,"  her  visitor  hastened  to  explain,  "if  he 
does  put  it  to  you  as  the  very  best  idea  he  has  for  you. 

56 


THE  OUTCRY 

When  he  does  that — as  I  believe  him  ready  to  do — will 
you  really  and  fairly  listen  to  him  ?  I'm  certain,  hon 
estly,  that  when  you  know  me  better — !"  His  con 
fidence  in  short  donned  a  bravery. 

"I've  been  feeling  this  quarter  of  an  hour,"  the  girl 
returned,  "that  I  do  know  you  better." 

"Then  isn't  that  all  I  want? — unless  indeed  I 
ought  perhaps  to  ask  rather  if  it  isn't  all  you  do! 
At  any  rate,"  said  Lord  John,  "I  may  see  you  again 
here?" 

She  waited  a  moment.  "You  must  have  patience 
with  me." 

"I  am  having  it.     But  after  your  father's  appeal." 

"Well,"  she  said,  "that  must  come  first." 

"Then  you  won't  dodge  it?" 

She  looked  at  him  straight.  "  I  don't  dodge,  Lord 
John." 

He  admired  the  manner  of  it.  "You  look  awfully 
handsome  as  you  say  so — and  you  see  what  that  does 
to  me."  As  to  attentuate  a  little  the  freedom  of  which 
he  went  on:  "May  I  fondly  hope  that  if  Lady  Imber 
too  should  wish  to  put  in  another  word  for  me ?" 

"Will  I  listen  to  her?"— it  brought  Lady  Grace 
straight  down.  "No,  Lord  John,  let  me  tell  you  at 
once  that  I'll  do  nothing  of  the  sort.  Kitty's  quite  an 
other  affair,  and  I  never  listen  to  her  a  bit  more  than 
I  can  help." 

57 


THE  OUTCRY 

Lord  John  appeared  to  feel,  on  this,  that  he  mustn't 
too  easily,  in  honour,  abandon  a  person  who  had  pre 
sented  herself  to  him  as  an  ally.  "Ah,  you  strike  me 
as  a  little  hard  on  her.  Your  father  himself — in  his 
looser  moments! — takes  pleasure  in  what  she  says." 

Our  young  woman's  eyes,  as  they  rested  on  him  af 
ter  this  remark,  had  no  mercy  for  its  extreme  feeble 
ness.  "  If  you  mean  that  she's  the  most  reckless  rat 
tle  one  knows,  and  that  she  never  looks  so  beautiful 
as  when  she's  at  her  worst,  and  that,  always  clever  for 
where  she  makes  out  her  interest,  she  has  learnt  to 
'get  round'  him  till  he  only  sees  through  her  eyes — if 
you  mean  that  I  understand  you  perfectly.  But  even 
if  you  think  me  horrid  for  reflecting  so  on  my  nearest 
and  dearest,  it's  not  on  the  side  on  which  he  has  most 
confidence  in  his  elder  daughter  that  his  youngest  is 
moved  to  have  most  confidence  in  him." 

Lord  John  stared  as  if  she  had  shaken  some  odd 
bright  fluttering  object  in  his  face;  but  then  recov 
ering  himself:  "He  hasn't  perhaps  an  absolutely 
boundless  confidence " 

"In  any  one  in  the  world  but  himself?" — she  had 
taken  him  straight  up.  "  He  hasn't  indeed,  and  that's 
what  we  must  come  to;  so  that  even  if  he  likes  you  as 
much  as  you  doubtless  very  justly  feel,  it  won't  be  be 
cause  you  are  right  about  your  being  nice,  but  because 
he  is!" 

58 


THE  OUTCRY 

"  You  mean  that  if  I  were  wrong  about  it  he  would 
still  insist  that  he  isn't  ?" 

Lady  Grace  was  indeed  sure.  "Absolutely — if  he 
had  begun  so!  He  began  so  with  Kitty — that  is  with 
allowing  her  everything." 

Lord  John  appeared  struck.  "Yes — and  he  still 
allows  her  two  thousand." 

"I'm  glad  to  hear  it — she  has  never  told  me  how 
much!"  the  girl  undisguisedly  smiled. 

"Then  perhaps  I  oughtn't!" — he  glowed  with  the 
light  of  contrition. 

"Well,  you  can't  help  it  now,"  his  companion  re 
marked  with  amusement. 

"You  mean  that  he  ought  to  allow  you  as  much?" 
Lord  John  inquired.  "I'm  sure  you're  right,  and 
that  he  will,"  he  continued  quite  as  in  good  faith; 
"but  I  want  you  to  understand  that  I  don't  care  in  the 
least  what  it  may  be!" 

The  subject  of  his  suit  took  the  longest  look  at 
him  she  had  taken  yet.  "You're  very  good  to  say 
so!" 

If  this  was  ironic  the  touch  fell  short,  thanks  to  his 
perception  that  they  had  practically  just  ceased  to  be 
alone.  They  were  in  presence  of  a  third  figure,  who 
had  arrived  from  the  terrace,  but  whose  approach  to 
them  was  not  so  immediate  as  to  deprive  Lord  John 
of  time  for  another  question.  "Will  you  let  him  tell 

59 


THE  OUTCRY 

you,  at  all  events,  how  good  he  thinks  me  ? — and  then 
let  me  come  back  and  have  it  from  you  again?" 

Lady  Grace's  answer  to  this  was  to  turn,  as  he  drew 
nearer,  to  the  person  by  whom  they  were  now  joined. 
"Lord  John  desires  you  should  tell  me,  father,  how 
good  you  think  him." 

"'Good,'  my  dear? — good  for  what?"  said  Lord 
Theign  a  trifle  absurdly,  but  looking  from  one  of  them 
to  the  other." 

"I  feel  I  must  ask  him  to  tell  you." 

"Then  I  shall  give  him  a  chance — as  I  should  par 
ticularly  like  you  to  go  back  and  deal  with  those  over 
whelming  children." 

"Ah,  they  don't  overwhelm  you,  father!" — the  girl 
put  it  with  some  point. 

"If  you  mean  to  say  I  overwhelmed  them,  I  dare  say 
I  did,"  he  replied — "from  my  view  of  that  vast  collec 
tive  gape  of  six  hundred  painfully  plain  and  perfectly 
expressionless  faces.  But  that  was  only  for  the  time: 
I  pumped  advice — oh  such  advice! — and  they  held 
the  large  bucket  as  still  as  my  pet  pointer,  when  I 
scratch  him,  holds  his  back.  The  bucket,  under  the 
stream " 

"Was  bound  to  overflow?"  Lady  Grace  sug 
gested. 

"Well,  the  strong  recoil  of  the  wave  of  intelligence 
has  been  not  unnaturally  followed  by  the  formidable 

60 


THE  OUTCRY 

break.  You  must  really,"  Lord  Theign  insisted,  "go 
and  deal  with  it." 

His  daughter's  smile,  for  all  this,  was  perceptibly 
cold.  "You  work  people  up,  father,  and  then  leave 
others  to  let  them  down." 

"The  two  things,"  he  promptly  replied,  "require 
different  natures."  To  which  he  simply  added,  as 
with  the  habit  of  authority,  though  not  of  harshness, 
"Go!" 

It  was  absolute  and  she  yielded;  only  pausing  an 
instant  to  look  as  with  a  certain  gathered  meaning 
from  one  of  the  men  to  the  other.  Faintly  and  re 
signedly  sighing  she  passed  away  to  the  terrace  and 
disappeared. 

"The  nature  that  can  let  you  down — I  rather  like 
it,  you  know!"  Lord  John  threw  off.  Which,  for  an 
airy  elegance  in  them,  were  perhaps  just  slightly  rash 
words — his  companion  gave  him  so  sharp  a  look  as 
the  two  were  left  together. 


VI 


FACE  to  face  with  his  visitor  the  master  of  Dedbor- 
ough  betrayed  the  impression  his  daughter  appeared 
to  have  given  him.  "She  didn't  want  to  go?"  And 
then  before  Lord  John  could  reply:  "What  the  deuce 
is  the  matter  with  her?" 

61 


THE  OUTCRY 

Lord  John  took  his  time.  "I  think  perhaps  a 
little  Mr.  Crimble." 

"And  who  the  deuce  is  a  little  Mr.  Crimble  ?" 

"A  young  man  who  was  just  with  her — and  whom 
she  appears  to  have  invited." 

"Where  is  he  then?"  Lord  Theign  demanded. 

"Off  there  among  the  pictures — which  he  seems 
partly  to  haVe  come  for." 

"Oh!"— it  made  his  lordship  easier.  "Then  he's 
all  right — on  such  a  day." 

His  companion  could  none  the  less  just  wonder. 
"Hadn't  Lady  Grace  told  you?" 

"That  he  was  coming?  Not  that  I  remember." 
But  Lord  Theign,  perceptibly  preoccupied,  made 
nothing  of  this.  "We've  had  other  fish  to  fry,  and 
you  know  the  freedom  I  allow  her." 

His  friend  had  a  vivid  gesture.  "My  dear  man,  I 
only  ask  to  profit  by  it ! "  With  which  there  might  well 
have  been  in  Lord  John's  face  a  light  of  comment  on 
the  pretension  in  such  a  quarter  to  allow  freedom. 

Yet  it  was  a  pretension  that  Lord  Theign  sustained 
— as  to  show  himself  far  from  all  bourgeois  narrow 
ness.  "She  has  her  friends  by  the  score — at  this  time 
of  day."  There  was  clearly  a  claim  here  also — to 
know  the  time  of  day.  "But  in  the  matter  of  friends 
where,  by  the  way,  is  your  own — of  whom  I've  but 
just  heard  ?" 

62 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Oh,  off  there  among  the  pictures  too;  so  they'll 
have  met  and  taken  care  of  each  other."  Accounting 
for  this  inquirer  would  be  clearly  the  least  of  Lord 
John's  difficulties.  "I  mustn't  appear  to  Bender  to 
have  failed  him;  but  I  must  at  once  let  you  know, 
before  I  join  him,  that,  seizing  my  opportunity,  I  have 
just  very  definitely,  in  fact  very  pressingly,  spoken  to 
Lady  Grace.  It  hasn't  been  perhaps,"  he  continued, 
"quite  the  pick  of  a  chance;  but  that  seemed  never 
to  come,  and  if  I'm  not  too  fondly  mistaken,  at  any 
rate,  she  listened  to  me  without  abhorrence.  Only 
I've  led  her  to  expect — for  our  case — that  you'll  be  so 
good,  without  loss  of  time,  as  to  say  the  clinching 
word  to  her  yourself." 

"Without  loss,  you  mean,  of — a — my  daughter's 
time?"  Lord  Theign,  confessedly  and  amiably  in 
terested,  had  accepted  these  intimations — yet  with  the 
very  blandness  that  was  not  accessible  to  hustling  and 
was  never  forgetful  of  its  standing  privilege  of  crit 
icism.  He  had  come  in  from  his  public  duty,  a  few 
minutes  before,  somewhat  flushed  and  blown;  but 
that  had  presently  dropped — to  the  effect,  we  should 
have  guessed,  of  his  appearing  to  Lord  John  at  least 
as  cool  as  the  occasion  required.  His  appearance,  we 
ourselves  certainly  should  have  felt,  was  in  all  respects 
charming — with  the  great  note  of  it  the  beautiful  rest 
less,  almost  suspicious,  challenge  to  you,  on  the  part  of 

63 


THE  OUTCRY 

deep  and  mixed  things  in  him,  his  pride  and  his  shy 
ness,  his  conscience,  his  taste  and  his  temper,  to  deny 
that  he  was  admirably  simple.  Obviously,  at  this  rate, 
he  had  a  passion  for  simplicity — simplicity,  above  all, 
of  relation  with  you,  and  would  show  you,  with  the  last 
subtlety  of  displeasure,  his  impatience  of  your  attempt 
ing  anything  more  with  himself.  With  such  an  ideal  of 
decent  ease  he  would,  confound  you,  "sink"  a  hun 
dred  other  attributes — or  the  recognition  at  least  and 
the  formulation  of  them — that  you  might  abjectly  have 
taken  for  granted  in  him:  just  to  show  you  that  in  a 
beastly  vulgar  age  you  had,  and  small  wonder,  a  beastly 
vulgar  imagination.  He  sank  thus,  surely,  in  defiance 
of  insistent  vulgarity,  half  his  consciousness  of  his  ad 
vantages,  flattering  himself  that  mere  facility  and  amia 
bility,  a  true  effective,  a  positively  ideal  suppression 
of  reference  in  any  one  to  anything  that  might  compli 
cate,  alone  floated  above.  This  would  be  quite  his  re 
ligion,  you  might  infer — to  cause  his  hands  to  ignore 
in  whatever  contact  any  opportunity,  however  con 
venient,  for  an  unfair  pull.  Which  habit  it  was  that 
must  have  produced  in  him  a  sort  of  ripe  and  radiant 
fairness;  if  it  be  allowed  us,  that  is,  to  figure  in  so  shin 
ing  an  air  a  nobleman  of  fifty-three,  of  an  undecided 
rather  than  a  certified  frame  or  outline,  of  a  head  thinly 
though  neatly  covered  and  not  measureably  massive, 
of  an  almost  trivial  freshness,  of  a  face  marked  but  by 

64 


THE  OUTCRY 

a  fine  inwrought  line  or  two  and  lighted  by  a  merely 
charming  expression.  You  might  somehow  have 
traced  back  the  whole  character  so  presented  to  an 
ideal  privately  invoked — that  of  his  establishing  in  the 
formal  garden  of  his  suffered  greatness  such  easy  seats 
and  short  perspectives,  such  winding  paths  and  natural- 
looking  waters,  as  would  mercifully  break  up  the  scale. 
You  would  perhaps  indeed  have  reflected  at  the  same 
time  that  the  thought  of  so  much  mercy  was  almost 
more  than  anything  else  the  thought  of  a  great  op 
tion  and  a  great  margin — in  fine  of  fifty  alternatives. 
Which  remarks  of  ours,  however,  leave  his  lordship 
with  his  last  immediate  question  on  his  hands. 

"Well,  yes — that,  of  course,  in  all  propriety,"  his 
companion  has  meanwhile  replied  to  it.  "  But  I  was 
thinking  a  little,  you  understand,  of  the  importance  of 
our  own  time." 

Divinably  Lord  Theign  put  himself  out  less,  as  we 
may  say,  for  the  comparatively  matter-of-course  haunt 
ers  of  his  garden  than  for  interlopers  even  but  slightly 
accredited.  He  seemed  thus  not  at  all  to  strain  to 
"understand"  in  this  particular  connection — it  would 
be  his  familiarly  amusing  friend  Lord  John,  clearly, 
who  must  do  most  of  the  work  for  him.  " '  Our  own ' 
in  the  sense  of  yours  and  mine?" 

"Of  yours  and  mine  and  Lady  Imber's,  yes — and 
a  good  bit,  last  not  least,  in  that  of  my  watching  and 

65 


THE  OUTCRY 

waiting  mother's."  This  struck  no  prompt  spark  of 
apprehension  from  his  listener,  so  that  Lord  John  went 
on:  "The  last  thing  she  did  this  morning  was  to  re 
mind  me,  with  her  fine  old  frankness,  that  she  would 
like  to  learn  without  more  delay  where,  on  the  whole 
question,  she  is,  don't  you  know  ?  What  she  put  to 
me" — the  younger  man  felt  his  ground  a  little,  but 
proceeded  further — "what  she  put  to  me,  with  her 
rather  grand  way  of  looking  all  questions  straight  in 
the  face,  you  see,  was:  Do  we  or  don't  we,  decidedly, 
take  up  practically  her  very  handsome  offer — 'very 
handsome'  being,  I  mean,  what  she  calls  it;  though  it 
strikes  even  me  too,  you  know,  as  rather  decent." 

Lord  Theign  at  this  point  resigned  himself  to  know. 
"  Kitty  has  of  course  rubbed  into  me  how  decent  she 
herself  finds  it.  She  hurls  herself  again  on  me — suc 
cessfully! — for  everything,  and  it  suits  her  down  to  the 
ground.  She  pays  her  beastly  debt — that  is,  I  mean 
to  say,"  and  he  took  himself  up,  though  it  was  scarce 
more  than  perfunctory,  "discharges  her  obligations — 
by  her  sister's  fair  hand;  not  to  mention  a  few  other 
trifles  for  which  I  naturally  provide." 

Lord  John,  a  little  unexpectedly  to  himself  on  the 
defensive,  was  yet  but  briefly  at  a  loss.  "  Of  course 
we  take  into  account,  don't  we  ?  not  only  the  fact  of 
my  mother's  desire  (intended,  I  assure  you,  to  be  most 
flattering)  that  Lady  Grace  shall  enter  our  family  with 

66 


THE  OUTCRY 

all  honours,  but  her  expressed  readiness  to  facilitate 
the  thing  by  an  understanding  over  and  above " 

"  Over  and  above  Kitty's  release  from  her  damnable 
payment?" — Lord  Theign  reached  out  to  what  his 
guest  had  left  rather  in  the  air.  "  Of  course  we  take 
everything  into  account— or  I  shouldn't,  my  dear  fel 
low,  be  discussing  with  you  at  all  a  business  one  or  two 
of  whose  aspects  so  little  appeal  to  me:  especially  as 
there's  nothing,  you  easily  conceive,  that  a  daughter  of 
mine  can  come  in  for  by  entering  even  your  family,  or 
any  other  (as  a  family)  that  she  wouldn't  be  quite  as 
sure  of  by  just  staying  in  her  own.  The  Duchess's 
idea,  at  any  rate,  if  I've  followed  you,  is  that  if  Grace 
does  accept  you  she  settles  on  you  twelve  thousand; 
with  the  condition " 

Lord  John  was  already  all  there.  "  Definitely,  yes, 
of  your  settling  the  equivalent  on  Lady  Grace." 

"And  what  do  you  call  the  equivalent  of  twelve 
thousand?" 

"  Why,  tacked  on  to  a  value  so  great  and  so  charm 
ing  as  Lady  Grace  herself,  I  dare  say  such  a  sum  as 
nine  or  ten  would  serve." 

"And  where  the  mischief,  if  you  please,  at  this  highly 
inconvenient  time,  am  I  to  pick  up  nine  or  ten  thou 
sand?" 

Lord  John  declined,  with  a  smiling,  a  fairly  irritat 
ing  eye  for  his  friend's  general  resources,  to  consider 

67 


THE  OUTCRY 

that  question  seriously.  "  Surely  you  can  have  no 
difficulty  whatever !" 

"Why  not? — when  you  can  see  for  yourself  that 
I've  had  this  year  to  let  poor  dear  old  Hill  Street! 
Do  you  call  it  the  moment  for  me  to  have  liked  to  see 
myself  all  but  cajoled  into  planking  down  even  such  a 
matter  as  the  very  much  lower  figure  of  Kitty's  horrid 
incubus?" 

"Ah,  but  the  inducement  and  the  quid  pro  quo" 
Lord  John  brightly  indicated,  "are  here  much  greater! 
In  the  case  you  speak  of  you  will  only  have  removed 
the  incubus — which,  I  grant  you,  she  must  and  you 
must  feel  as  horrid.  In  this  other  you  pacify  Lady 
Imber  and  marry  Lady  Grace:  marry  her  to  a  man 
who  has  set  his  heart  on  her  and  of  whom  she  has  just 
expressed — to  himself — a  very  kind  and  very  high 
opinion." 

"She  has  expressed  a  very  high  opinion  of  you?" 
— Lord  Theign  scarce  glowed  with  credulity. 

But  the  younger  man  held  his  ground.  "She  has 
told  me  she  thoroughly  likes  me  and  that — though  a 
fellow  feels  an  ass  repeating  such  things — she  thinks 
me  perfectly  charming." 

"A  tremendous  creature,  eh,  all  round?  Then," 
said  Lord  Theign,  "what  does  she  want  more?" 

"She  very  possibly  wants  nothing — but  I'm  to  that 
beastly  degree,  you  see,"  his  visitor  patiently  explained, 

68 


THE  OUTCRY 

"in  the  cleft  stick  of  my  fearfully  positive  mother's 
wants.  Those  are  her  '  terms,'  and  I  don't  mind  say 
ing  that  they're  most  disagreeable  to  me — I  quite  hate 
'em:  there!  Only  I  think  it  makes  a  jolly  difference 
that  I  wouldn't  touch  'em  with  a  long  pole  if  my  per 
sonal  feeling — in  respect  to  Lady  Grace — wasn't  so 
immensely  enlisted." 

"I  assure  you  I'd  chuck  'em  out  of  window,  my  boy, 
if  I  didn't  believe  you'd  be  really  good  to  her,"  Lord 
Theign  returned  with  the  properest  spirit. 

It  only  encouraged  his  companion.  "  You  will  just 
tell  her  then,  now  and  here,  how  good  you  honestly  be 
lieve  I  shall  be  ?" 

This  appeal  required  a  moment — a  longer  look  at 
him.  "You  truly  hold  that  that  friendly  guarantee, 
backed  by  my  parental  weight,  will  do  your  job?" 

"That's  the  conviction  I  entertain." 

Lord  Theign  thought  again.  "Well,  even  if  your 
conviction's  just,  that  still  doesn't  tell  me  into  which 
of  my  very  empty  pockets  it  will  be  of  the  least  use  for 
me  to  fumble." 

"Oh,"  Lord  John  laughed,  "when  a  man  has  such 
a  tremendous  assortment  of  breeches — !"  He  pulled 
up,  however,  as,  in  his  motion,  his  eye  caught  the  great 
vista  of  the  open  rooms.  "  If  it's  a  question  of  pock 
ets — and  what's  in  'em — here  precisely  is  my  man!" 
This  personage  had  come  back  from  his  tour  of  obser- 


THE  OUTCRY 

vation  and  was  now,  on  the  threshold  of  the  hall, 
exhibited  to  Lord  Theign  as  well.  Lord  John's  wel 
come  was  warm.  "I've  had  awfully  to  fail  you,  Mr. 
Bender,  but  I  was  on  the  point  of  joining  you.  Let  me, 
however,  still  better,  introduce  you  to  our  host." 


VII 


MR.  BENDER  indeed,  formidably  advancing,  scarce 
had  use  for  this  assistance.  "Happy  to  meet  you — 
especially  in  your  beautiful  home,  Lord  Theign." 
To  which  he  added  while  the  master  of  Dedborough 
stood  good-humouredly  passive  to  his  approach: 
"I've  been  round,  by  your  kind  permission  and  the 
light  of  nature,  and  haven't  required  support;  though 
if  I  had  there's  a  gentleman  there  who  seemed  pre 
pared  to  allow  me  any  amount."  Mr.  Bender,  out 
of  his  abundance,  evoked  as  by  a  suggestive  hand  this 
contributory  figure.  "A  young,  spare,  nervous  gen 
tleman  with  eye-glasses — I  guess  he's  an  author.  A 
friend  of  yours  too?"  he  asked  of  Lord  John. 

The  answer  was  prompt  and  emphatic.  "No,  the 
gentleman  is  no  friend  at  all  of  mine,  Mr.  Bender." 

"A  friend  of  my  daughter's,"  Lord  Theign  easily 
explained.  "I  hope  they're  looking  after  him." 

"  Oh,  they  took  care  he  had  tea  and  bread  and  but 
ter  to  any  extent;  and  were  so  good  as  to  move  some- 

70 


THE  OUTCRY 

thing,"  Mr.  Bender  conscientiously  added,  "so  that 
he  could  get  up  on  a  chair  and  see  straight  into  the 
Moretto." 

This  was  a  touch,  however,  that  appeared  to  affect 
Lord  John  unfavourably.  "Up  on  a  chair?  I  say!" 

Mr.  Bender  took  another  view.  "  Why,  I  got  right 
up  myself — a  little  more  and  I'd  almost  have  begun  to 
paw  it!  He  got  me  quite  interested" — the  proprietor 
of  the  picture  would  perhaps  care  to  know — "in  that 
Moretto."  And  it  was  on  these  lines  that  Mr.  Bender 
continued  to  advance.  "I  take  it  that  your  biggest 
value,  however,  Lord  Theign,  is  your  splendid  Sir 
Joshua.  Our  friend  there  has  a  great  deal  to  say  about 
that  too — but  it  didn't  lead  to  our  moving  any  more 
furniture."  On  which  he  paused  as  to  enjoy,  with  a 
show  of  his  fine  teeth,  his  host's  reassurance.  "  It  has 
yet,  my  impression  of  that  picture,  sir,  led  to  some 
thing  else.  Are  you  prepared,  Lord  Theign,  to  enter 
tain  a  proposition?" 

Lord  Theign  met  Mr.  Bender's  eyes  while  this  in 
quirer  left  these  few  portentous  words  to  speak  for 
themselves.  "To  the  effect  that  I  part  to  you  with 
'The  Beautiful  Duchess  of  Waterbridge'?  No,  Mr. 
Bender,  such  a  proposition  would  leave  me  intensely 
cold." 

Lord  John  had  meanwhile  had  a  more  headlong 
cry.  "My  dear  Bender,  I  envy  you!" 


THE  OUTCRY 

"I  guess  you  don't  envy  me,"  his  friend  serenely  re 
plied,  "as  much  as  I  envy  Lord  Theign."  And  then 
while  Mr.  Bender  and  the  latter  continued  to  face  each 
other  searchingly  and  firmly:  "What  I  allude  to  is 
an  overture  of  a  strong  and  simple  stamp — such  as  per 
haps  would  shed  a  softer  light  on  the  difficulties  raised 
by  association  and  attachment.  I've  had  some  experi 
ence  of  first  shocks,  and  I'd  be  glad  to  meet  you  as  man 
to  man." 

Mr.  Bender  was,  quite  clearly,  all  genial  and  all 
sincere;  he  intended  no  irony  and  used,  consciously, 
no  great  freedom.  Lord  Theign,  not  less  evidently, 
saw  this,  and  it  permitted  him  amusement.  "As  rich 
man  to  poor  man  is  how  I'm  to  understand  it?  For 
me  to  meet  you,"  he  added,  "I  should  have  to  be 
tempted — and  I'm  not  even  temptable.  So  there  we 
— are,"  he  blandly  smiled. 

His  blandness  appeared  even  for  a  moment  to  set 
an  example  to  Lord  John.  "'The  Beautiful  Duchess 
of  Waterbridge,'  Mr.  Bender,  is  a  golden  apple  of  one 
of  those  great  family  trees  of  which  respectable  peo 
ple  don't  lop  off  the  branches  whose  venerable  shade, 
in  this  garish  and  denuded  age,  they  so  much  enjoy." 

Mr.  Bender  looked  at  him  as  if  he  had  cut  some  ir 
relevant  caper.  "Then  if  they  don't  sell  their  ances 
tors  where  in  the  world  are  all  the  ancestors  bought?" 

"  Doesn't  it  for  the  moment  sufficiently  answer  your 
72 


THE  OUTCRY 

question,"  Lord  Theign  asked,  "  that  they're  definitely 
not  bought  at  Dedborough?" 

"Why,"  said  Mr.  Bender  with  a  wealthy  patience, 
"you  talk  as  if  it  were  my  interest  to  be  reasonable — 
which  shows  how  little  you  understand.  I'd  be 
ashamed — with  the  lovely  ideas  I  have — if  I  didn't 
make  you  kick."  And  his  sturdy  smile  for  it  all  fairly 
proclaimed  his  faith.  "Well,  I  guess  I  can  wait!" 

This  again  in  turn  visibly  affected  Lord  John: 
marking  the  moment  from  which  he,  in  spite  of  his 
cultivated  levity,  allowed  an  intenser  and  more  sus 
tained  look  to  keep  straying  toward  their  host.  "  Mr. 
Bender's  bound  to  have  something!" 

It  was  even  as  if  after  a  minute  Lord  Theign  had 
been  reached  by  his  friend's  mute  pressure.  " '  Some 
thing'?" 

"Something,  Mr.  Bender?"    Lord  John  insisted. 

It  made  their  visitor  rather  sharply  fix  him.  "  Why, 
have  you  an  interest,  Lord  John?" 

This  personage,  though  undisturbed  by  the  chal 
lenge,  if  such  it  was,  referred  it  to  Lord  Theign.  "  Do 
you  authorise  me  to  speak — a  little — as  if  I  have  an 
interest?" 

Lord  Theign  gave  the  appeal — and  the  speaker — a 
certain  attention,  and  then  appeared  rather  sharply 
to  turn  away  from  them.  "  My  dear  fellow,  you  may 
amuse  yourself  at  my  expense  as  you  like!" 

73 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Oh,  I  don't  mean  at  your  expense,"  Lord  John 
laughed — "I  mean  at  Mr.  Bender's!" 

"Well,  go  ahead,  Lord  John,"  said  that  gentleman, 
always  easy,  but  always  too,  as  you  would  have  felt, 
aware  of  everything — "go  ahead,  but  don't  sweetly 
hope  to  create  me  in  any  desire  that  doesn't  already  ex 
ist  in  the  germ.  The  attempt  has  often  been  made, 
over  here — has  in  fact  been  organised  on  a  considerable 
scale;  but  I  guess  I've  got  some  peculiarity,  for  it 
doesn't  seem  as  if  the  thing  could  be  done.  If  the 
germ  is  there,  on  the  other  hand,"  Mr.  Bender  con 
ceded,  "it  develops  independently  of  all  encourage 
ment." 

Lord  John  communicated  again  as  in  a  particular 
sense  with  Lord  Theign.  "He  thinks  I  really  mean 
to  offer  him  something!" 

Lord  Theign,  who  seemed  to  wish  to  advertise  a 
degree  of  detachment  from  the  issue,  or  from  any  other 
such,  strolled  off,  in  his  restlessness,  toward  the  door 
that  opened  to  the  terrace,  only  stopping  on  his  way  to 
light  a  cigarette  from  a  matchbox  on  a  small  table. 
It  was  but  after  doing  so  that  he  made  the  remark: 
"Ah,  Mr.  Bender  may  easily  be  too  much  for 
you!" 

"That  makes  me  the  more  sorry,  sir,"  said  his  vis 
itor,  "not  to  have  been  enough  for  you!" 

"I  risk  it,  at  any  rate,"  Lord  John  went  on — "I  put 
74 


THE  OUTCRY 

you,  Bender,  the  question  of  whether  you  wouldn't 
'love/  as  you  say,  to  acquire  that  Moretto." 

Mr.  Bender's  large  face  had  a  commensurate  gaze. 
"As  I  say?  I  haven't  said  anything  of  the  sort!" 

"But  you  do  'love,'  you  know,  "Lord  John  slightly 
overgrimaced. 

"I  don't  when  I  don't  want  to.  I'm  different  from 
most  people — I  can  love  or  not  as  I  like.  The  trouble 
with  that  Moretto,"  Mr.  Bender  continued,  "is  that 
it  ain't  what  I'm  after." 

His  "after"  had  somehow,  for  the  ear,  the  vividness 
of  a  sharp  whack  on  the  resisting  surface  of  things, 
and  was  concerned  doubtless  in  Lord  John's  speaking 
again  across  to  their  host.  "The  worst  he  can  do  for 
me,  you  see,  is  to  refuse  it." 

Lord  Theign,  who  practically  had  his  back  turned 
and  was  fairly  dandling  about  in  his  impatience,  tossed 
out  to  the  terrace  the  cigarette  he  had  but  just  lighted. 
Yet  he  faced  round  to  reply:  "It's  the  very  first  time 
in  the  history  of  this  house  (a  long  one,  Mr.  Bender) 
that  a  picture,  or  anything  else  in  it,  has  been 
offered !" 

It  was  not  imperceptible  that  even  if  he  hadn't 
dropped  Mr.  Bender  mightn't  have  been  markedly  im 
pressed.  "Then  it  must  be  the  very  first  time  such  an 
offer  has  failed." 

"Oh,  it  isn't  that  we  in  the  least  press  it!"  Lord 
Theign  quite  naturally  laughed. 

75 


THE  OUTCRY 

aAh,  I  beg  your  pardon — I  press  it  very  hard!" 
And  Lord  John,  as  taking  from  his  face  and  manner 
a  cue  for  further  humorous  license,  went  so  far  as  to 
emulate,  though  sympathetically  enough,  their  com 
panion's  native  form.  "You  don't  mean  to  say  you 
don't  feel  the  interest  of  that  Moretto?" 

Mr.  Bender,  quietly  confident,  took  his  time  to  re 
ply.  "  Well,  if  you  had  seen  me  up  on  that  chair  you'd 
have  thought  I  did." 

"  Then  you  must  have  stepped  down  from  the  chair 
properly  impressed." 

"I  stepped  down  quite  impressed  with  that  young 
man." 

"Mr.  Crimble?" — it  came  after  an  instant  to 
Lord  John.  "With  his  opinion,  really?  Then  I 
hope  he's  aware  of  the  picture's  value." 

"You  had  better  ask  him,"  Mr.  Bender  ob 
served. 

"Oh,  we  don't  depend  here  on  the  Mr.  Crimbles!" 
Lord  John  returned. 

Mr.  Bender  took  a  longer  look  at  him.  "Are  you 
aware  of  the  value  yourself?" 

His  friend  resorted  again,  as  for  the  amusement  of 
the  thing,  to  their  entertainer.  "Am  I  aware  of  the 
value  of  the  Moretto?" 

Lord  Theign,  who  had  meanwhile  lighted  another 
cigarette,  appeared,  a  bit  extravagantly  smoking,  to 
wish  to  put  an  end  to  his  effect  of  hovering  aloof. 

76 


THE  OUTCRY 

"That  question  needn't  trouble  us — when  I  see  how 
much  Mr.  Bender  himself  knows  about  it." 

"  Well,  Lord  Theign,  I  only  know  what  that  young 
man  puts  it  at."  And  then  as  the  others  waited," Ten 
thousand,"  said  Mr.  Bender. 

"Ten  thousand  ?"  The  owner  of  the  work  showed 
no  emotion. 

"Well,"  said  Lord  John  again  in  Mr.  Bender's 
style,  "what's  the  matter  with  ten  thousand?" 

The  subject  of  his  gay  tribute  considered.  "  There's 
nothing  the  matter  with  ten  thousand." 

"Then,"  Lord  Theign  asked,  "is  there  anything  the 
matter  with  the  picture?" 

"Yes,  sir — I  guess  there  is." 

It  gave  an  upward  push  to  his  lordship's  eyebrows. 
"But  what  in  the  world ?" 

"Well,  that's  just  the  question!" 

The  eyebrows  continued  to  rise.  "  Does  he  pretend 
there's  a  question  of  whether  it  is  a  Moretto?" 

"That's  what  he  was  up  there  trying  to  find  out." 

"But  if  the  value's,  according  to  himself,  ten  thou 
sand ?" 

'Why,  of  course,"  said  Mr.  Bender,  "  it's  a  fine  work 
anyway." 

"Then,"  Lord  Theign  brought  good-naturedly  out, 
"what's  the  matter  with  you,  Mr.  Bender?" 

That  gentleman  was  perfectly  clear.  "The  matter 
77 


THE  OUTCRY 

with  me,  Lord  Theign,  is  that  I've  no  use  for  a  ten 
thousand  picture." 

" ' No  use ? '  "—the  expression  had  an  oddity.  "But 
what's  it  your  idea  to  do  with  such  things?" 

"I  mean,"  Mr.  Bender  explained,  "that  a  picture 
of  that  rank  is  not  what  I'm  after." 

"The  figure,"  said  his  noble  host — speaking  thus, 
under  pressure,  commercially — "is  beyond  what  you 
see  your  way  to?" 

But  Lord  John  had  jumped  at  the  truth.  "The 
matter  with  Mr.  Bender  is  that  he  sees  his  way  much 
further." 

"Further?"  their  companion  echoed. 

"The  matter  with  Mr.  Bender  is  that  he  wants  to 
give  millions." 

Lord  Theign  sounded  this  abyss  with  a  smile. 
"Well,  there  would  be  no  difficulty  about  that,  I 
think!" 

"Ah,"  said  his  guest,  "you  know  the  basis,  sir,  on 
which  I'm  ready  to  pay." 

"On  the  basis  then  of  the  Sir  Joshua,"  Lord  John 
inquired,  "how  far  would  you  go?" 

Mr.  Bender  indicated  by  a  gesture  that  on  a  question 
reduced  to  a  moiety  by  its  conditional  form  he  could 
give  but  semi-satisfaction.  "  Well,  I'd  go  all  the  way." 

"He  wants,  you  see,"  Lord  John  elucidated,  "an 
ideally  expensive  thing." 

78 


THE  OUTCRY 

Lord  Theign  appeared  to  decide  after  a  moment  to 
enter  into  the  pleasant  spirit  of  this;  which  he  did  by 
addressing  his  younger  friend.  "Then  why  shouldn't 
I  make  even  the  Moretto  as  expensive  as  he  desires?" 

"  Because  you  can't  do  violence  to  that  master's  nat 
ural  modesty,"  Mr.  Bender  declared  before  Lord  John 
had  time  to  speak.  And  conscious  at  this  moment 
of  the  reappearance  of  his  fellow-explorer,  he  at  once 
supplied  a  further  light.  "I  guess  this  gentleman  at 
any  rate  can  tell  you." 

VIII 

HUGH  CRIMBLE  had  come  back  from  his  voyage  of 
discovery,  and  it  was  visible  as  he  stood  there  flushed 
and  quite  radiant  that  he  had  caught  in  his  approach 
Lord  Theign's  last  inquiry  and  Mr.  Bender's  reply  to 
it.  You  would  have  imputed  to  him  on  the  spot  the 
lively  possession  of  a  new  idea,  the  sustaining  sense  of 
a  message  important  enough  to  justify  his  irruption. 
He  looked  from  one  to  the  other  of  the  three  men, 
scattered  a  little  by  the  sight  of  him,  but  attached 
eyes  of  recognition  then  to  Lord  Theign's,  whom  he 
remained  an  instant  longer  communicatively  smiling 
at.  After  which,  as  you  might  have  gathered,  he  all 
confidently  plunged,  taking  up  the  talk  where  the 
others  had  left  it.  "I  should  say,  Lord  Theign,  if 

79 


THE  OUTCRY 

you'll  allow  me,  in  regard  to  what  you  appear  to  have 
been  discussing,  that  it  depends  a  good  deal  on  just 
that  question — of  what  your  Moretto,  at  any  rate,  may 
be  presumed  or  proved  to  'be.'  Let  me  thank  you," 
he  cheerfully  went  on,  "  for  your  kind  leave  to  go  over 
your  treasures." 

The  personage  he  so  addressed  was,  as  we  know, 
nothing  if  not  generally  affable;  yet  if  that  was  just  then 
apparent  it  was  through  a  shade  of  coolness  for  the 
slightly  heated  familiarity  of  so  plain,  or  at  least  so 
free,  a  young  man  in  eye-glasses,  now  for  the  first  time 
definitely  apprehended.  "  Oh,  I've  scarcely '  treasures ' 
—but  I've  some  things  of  interest." 

Hugh,  however,  entering  the  opulent  circle,  as  it 
were,  clearly  took  account  of  no  breath  of  a  chill.  "  I 
think  possible,  my  lord,  that  you've  a  great  treasure — 
if  you've  really  so  high  a  rarity  as  a  splendid  Manto- 
vano." 

"A  'Mantovano'?"  You  wouldn't  have  been  sure 
that  his  lordship  didn't  pronounce  the  word  for  the  first 
time  in  his  life. 

"There  have  been  supposed  to  be  only  seven  real  ex 
amples  about  the  world;  so  that  if  by  an  extraordinary 
chance  you  find  yourself  the  possessor  of  a  magnificent 
eighth " 

But  Lord  John  had  already  broken  in.  "Why, 
there  you  are,  Mr.  Bender!" 

80 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Oh,  Mr.  Bender,  with  whom  I've  made  acquaint 
ance,"  Hugh  returned,  "  was  there  as  it  began  to  work 
in  me " 

"That  your  Moretto,  Lord  Theign"— Mr.  Bender 
took  their  informant  up — "  isn't,  after  all,  a  Moretto  at 
all."  And  he  continued  amusedly  to  Hugh :  "  It  began 
to  work  in  you,  sir,  like  very  strong  drink!" 

"Do  I  understand  you  to  suggest,"  Lord  Theign 
asked  of  the  startling  young  man,  "that  my  precious 
picture  isn't  genuine?" 

Well,  Hugh  knew  exactly  what  he  suggested.  "As 
a  picture,  Lord  Theign,  as  a  great  portrait,  one  of  the 
most  genuine  things  in  Europe.  But  it  strikes  me  as 
probable  that  from  far  back — for  reasons! — there  has 
been  a  wrong  attribution;  that  the  work  has  been,  in 
other  words,  traditionally,  obstinately  miscalled.  It 
has  passed  for  a  Moretto,  and  at  first  I  quite  took  it 
for  one;  but  I  suddenly,  as  I  looked  and  looked  and 
saw  and  saw,  began  to  doubt,  and  now  I  know  why 
I  doubted." 

Lord  Theign  had  during  this  speech  kept  his  eyes 
on  the  ground;  but  he  raised  them  to  Mr.  Crimble's 
almost  palpitating  presence  for  the  remark:  "I'm 
bound  to  say  that  I  hope  you've  some  very  good 
grounds ! " 

"I've  three  or  four,  Lord  Theign;  they  seem  to  me 
of  the  best — as  yet.  They  made  me  wonder  and  won 
der — and  then  light  splendidly  broke." 

81 


THE  OUTCRY 

His  lordship  didn't  stint  his  attention.  "  Reflected, 
you  mean,  from  other  Mantovanos — that  I  don't 
know?" 

"I  mean  from  those  I  know  myself,"  said  Hugh; 
"and  I  mean  from  fine  analogies  with  one  in  par 
ticular." 

" Analogies  that  in  all  these  years,  these  centuries, 
have  so  remarkably  not  been  noticed?" 

"  Well,"  Hugh  competently  explained, "  they're  a  sort 
of  thing  the  very  sense  of,  the  value  and  meaning  of, 
are  a  highly  modern — in  fact  a  quite  recent  growth." 

Lord  John  at  this  professed  with  cordiality  that  he 
at  least  quite  understood.  "  Oh,  we  know  a  lot  more 
about  our  pictures  and  things  than  ever  our  ancestors 
did!" 

"Well,  I  guess  it's  enough  for  me"  Mr.  Bender  con 
tributed,  "that  your  ancestors  knew  enough  to  get 
'em!" 

"Ah,  that  doesn't  go  so  far,"  cried  Hugh,  "unless  we 
ourselves  know  enough  to  keep  'em!" 

The  words  appeared  to  quicken  in  a  manner  Lord 
Theign's  view  of  the  speaker.  "  Were  your  ancestors, 
Mr.  Crimble,  great  collectors?" 

Arrested,  it  might  be,  in  his  general  assurance, 
Hugh  wondered  and  smiled.  "Mine — collectors? 
Oh,  I'm  afraid  I  haven't  any — to  speak  of.  Only  it 
has  seemed  to  me  for  a  long  time,"  he  added,  "that  on 
that  head  we  should  all  feel  together." 

82 


THE  OUTCRY 

Lord  Theign  looked  for  a  moment  as  if  these  were 
rather  large  presumptions;  then  he  put  them  in  their 
place  a  little  curtly.  "  It's  one  thing  to  keep  our  pos 
sessions  for  ourselves — it's  another  to  keep  them  for 
other  people." 

"Well,"  Hugh  good-humouredly  returned,  "I'm 
perhaps  not  so  absolutely  sure  of  myself,  if  you  press 
me,  as  that  I  sha'n't  be  glad  of  a  higher  and  wiser  opin 
ion — I  mean  than  my  own.  It  would  be  awfully  in 
teresting,  if  you'll  allow  me  to  say  so,  to  have  the  judg 
ment  of  one  or  two  of  the  great  men." 

"  You're  not  yourself,  Mr.  Crimble,  one  of  the  great 
men?"  his  host  asked  with  tempered  irony. 

"Well,  I  guess  he's  going  to  be,  anyhow,"  Mr.  Ben 
der  cordially  struck  in;  "and  this  remarkable  exhibi 
tion  of  intelligence  may  just  let  him  loose  on  the  world, 
mayn't  it?" 

"Thank  you,  Mr.  Bender!" — and  Hugh  obviously 
tried  to  look  neither  elated  nor  snubbed.  "I've  too 
much  still  to  learn,  but  I'm  learning  every  day,  and 
I  shall  have  learnt  immensely  this  afternoon." 

"  Pretty  well  at  my  expense,  however,"  Lord  Theign 
laughed,  "  if  you  demolish  a  name  we've  held  for  gen 
erations  so  dear." 

"You  may  have  held  the  name  dear,  my  lord,"  his 
young  critic  answered;  "but  my  whole  point  is  that, 
if  I'm  right,  you've  held  the  picture  itself  cheap." 

83 


THE  OUTCRY 

" Because  a  Mantovano,"  said  Lord  John,  "is  so 
much  greater  a  value?" 

Hugh  met  his  eyes  a  moment.  "  Are  you  talking  of 
values  pecuniary  ?" 

"What  values  are  not  pecuniary ?" 

Hugh  might,  during  his  hesitation,  have  been  imag 
ined  to  stand  off  a  little  from  the  question.  "Well, 
some  things  have  in  a  higher  degree  that  one,  and  some 
have  the  associational  or  the  factitious,  and  some  the 
clear  artistic." 

"And  some,"  Mr.  Bender  opined,  "have  them  all 
— in  the  highest  degree.  But  what  you  mean,"  he 
went  on,  "is  that  a  Mantovano  would  come  higher 
under  the  hammer  than  a  Moretto?" 

"Why,  sir,"  the  young  man  returned,  "there  aren't 
any,  as  I've  just  stated,  to  'come.'  I  account — 
or  I  easily  can — for  every  one  of  the  very  small  num 
ber." 

"Then  do  you  consider  that  you  account  for  this 
one?" 

"I  believe  I  shall  if  you'll  give  me  time." 

"Oh,  time!"  Mr.  Bender  impatiently  sighed. 
"  But  we'll  give  you  all  we've  got — only  I  guess  it  isn't 
much."  And  he  appeared  freely  to  invite  their  com 
panions  to  join  in  this  estimate.  They  listened  to  him, 
however,  they  watched  him,  for  the  moment,  but  in 
silence,  and  with  the  next  he  had  gone  on:  "How 

84 


THE  OUTCRY 

much  higher — if  your  idea  is  correct  about  it — would 
Lord  Theign's  picture  come?" 

Hugh  turned  to  that  nobleman.  "Does  Mr.  Ben 
der  mean  come  to  him,  my  lord?" 

Lord  Theign  looked  again  hard  at  Hugh,  and  then 
harder  than  he  had  done  yet  at  his  other  invader.  "I 
don't  know  what  Mr.  Bender  means!"  With  which 
he  turned  off. 

"Well,  I  guess  I  mean  that  it  would  come  higher  to 
me  than  to  any  one!  But  how  much  higher?"  the 
American  continued  to  Hugh. 

"How  much  higher  to  you?" 

"  Oh,  I  can  size  that.  How  much  higher  as  a  Man- 
tovano?" 

Unmistakably — for  us  at  least — our  young  man  was 
gaining  time;  he  had  the  instinct  of  circumspection 
and  delay.  "To  any  one?" 

"To  any  one." 

"Than  as  a  Moretto?"  Hugh  continued. 

It  even  acted  on  Lord  John's  nerves.  "  That's  what 
we're  talking  about — really!" 

But  Hugh  still  took  his  ease;  as  if,  with  his  eyes 
first  on  Bender  and  then  on  Lord  Theign,  whose  back 
was  practically  presented,  he  were  covertly  studying 
signs.  "  Well,"  he  presently  said,  "  in  view  of  the  very 
great  interest  combined  with  the  very  great  rarity, 
more  than — ah  more  than  can  be  estimated  off-hand." 

85 


THE  OUTCRY 

It  made  Lord  Theign  turn  round.  "But  a  fine 
Moretto  has  a  very  great  rarity  and  a  very  great  in 
terest." 

"Yes— but  not  on  the  whole  the  same  amount  of 
either." 

"No,  not  on  the  whole  the  same  amount  of  either!" 
— Mr.  Bender  judiciously  echoed  it.  "But  how,"  he 
freely  pursued,  "are  you  going  to  find  out?" 

"Have  I  your  permission,  Lord  Theign,"  Hugh 
brightly  asked,  "to  attempt  to  find  out?" 

The  question  produced  on  his  lordship's  part  a  visi 
ble,  a  natural  anxiety.  "What  would  it  be  your  idea 
then  to  do  with  my  property?" 

"Nothing  at  all  here — it  could  all  be  done,  I  think, 
at  Verona.  What  besets,  what  quite  haunts  me," 
Hugh  explained,  "is  the  vivid  image  of  a  Mantovano 
— one  of  the  glories  of  the  short  list — in  a  private  col 
lection  in  that  place.  The  conviction  grows  in  me  that 
the  two  portraits  must  be  of  the  same  original.  In 
fact  I'll  bet  my  head,"  the  young  man  quite  ardently 
wound  up,  "that  the  wonderful  subject  of  the  Verona 
picture,  a  very  great  person  clearly,  is  none  other  than 
the  very  great  person  of  yours." 

Lord  Theign  had  listened  with  interest.  "Mayn't 
he  be  that  and  yet  from  another  hand?" 

"It  isn't  another  hand" — oh  Hugh  was  quite  posi 
tive.  "It's  the  hand  of  the  very  same  painter." 

86 


THE  OUTCRY 

"How  can  you  prove  it's  the  same?" 

"Only  by  the  most  intimate  internal  evidence,  I 
admit — and  evidence  that  of  course  has  to  be  esti 
mated." 

"Then  who,"  Lord  Theign  asked,  "is  to  estimate 
it?" 

"Well,"— Hugh  was  all  ready— "will  you  let  Pap- 
pendick,  one  of  the  first  authorities  in  Europe,  a  good 
friend  of  mine,  in  fact  more  or  less  my  master,  and 
who  is  generally  to  be  found  at  Brussels  ?  I  happen  to 
know  he  knows  your  picture — he  once  spoke  to  me  of 
it;  and  he'll  go  and  look  again  at  the  Verona  one, 
he'll  go  and  judge  our  issue,  if  I  apply  to  him,  in  the 
light  of  certain  new  tips  that  I  shall  be  able  to  give 
him." 

Lord  Theign  appeared  to  wonder.  "If  you  'ap 
ply'  to  him?" 

"Like  a  shot,  I  believe,  if  I  ask  it  of  him — as  a  ser 
vice." 

"A  service  to  you?  He'll  be  very  obliging,"  his 
lordship  smiled. 

"Well,  I've  obliged  him  I'1   Hugh  readily  retorted. 

"The  obligation  will  be  to  we"— Lord  Theign 
spoke  more  formally. 

"Well,  the  satisfaction,"  said  Hugh,  "will  be  to  all 
of  us.  The  things  Pappendick  has  seen  he  intensely, 
ineffaceably  keeps  in  mind,  to  every  detail;  so  that 

8? 


THE  OUTCRY 

he'll  tell  me — as  no  one  else  really  can — if  the  Verona 
man  is  your  man." 

"But  then,"  asked  Mr.  Bender,  "we've  got  to  be 
lieve  anyway  what  he  says?" 

"The  market,"  said  Lord  John  with  emphasis, 
"would  have  to  believe  it — that's  the  point." 

"  Oh,"  Hugh  returned  lightly,  "  the  market  will  have 
nothing  to  do  with  it,  I  hope;  but  I  think  you'll  feel 
when  he  has  spoken  that  you  really  know  where  you 
are." 

Mr.  Bender  couldn't  doubt  of  that.  "Oh,  if  he 
gives  us  a  bigger  thing  we  won't  complain.  Only, 
how  long  will  it  take  him  to  get  there?  I  want  him 
to  start  right  away." 

"Well,  as  I'm  sure  he'll  be  deeply  interested— 

"We  may" — Mr.  Bender  took  it  straight  up — "get 
news  next  week?" 

Hugh  addressed  his  reply  to  Lord  Theign;  it  was  al 
ready  a  little  too  much  as  if  he  and  the  American  be 
tween  them  were  snatching  the  case  from  that  posses 
sor's  hands.  "The  day  I  hear  from  Pappendick  you 
shall  have  a  full  report.  And,"  he  conscientiously 
added,  "if  I'm  proved  to  have  been  unfortunately 
wrong !" 

His  lordship  easily  pointed  the  moral.  "You'll 
have  caused  me  some  inconvenience." 

"Of  course  I  shall,"  the  young  man  unreservedly 
88 


THE  OUTCRY 

agreed — "like  a  wanton  meddling  ass!"  His  can 
dour,  his  freedom  had  decidedly  a  note  of  their  own. 
"  But  my  conviction,  after  those  moments  with  your 
picture,  was  too  strong  for  me  not  to  speak — and, 
since  you  allow  it,  I  face  the  danger  and  risk  the 
test." 

"I  allow  it  of  course  in  the  form  of  business." 
This  produced  in  Hugh  a  certain  blankness.  "  l  Bus 
iness'?" 

"If  I  consent  to  the  inquiry  I  pay  for  the  inquiry." 
Hugh  demurred.  "Even  if  I  turn  out  mistaken?" 
"You  make  me  in  any  event  your  proper  charge." 
The  young  man  thought  again,  and  then  as  for  vague 
accommodation:  "Oh,  my  charge  won't  be  high!" 

"Ah,"  Mr.  Bender  protested,  "it  ought  to  be  hand 
some  if  the  thing's  marked  up!"  After  which  he 
looked  at  his  watch.  "  But  I  guess  I've  got  to  go,  Lord 
Theign,  though  your  lovely  old  Duchess — for  it's  to 
her  I've  lost  my  heart — does  cry  out  for  me  again." 

"You'll  find  her  then  still  there,"  Lord  John  ob 
served  with  emphasis,  but  with  his  eyes  for  the  time  on 
Lord  Theign;  "and  if  you  want  another  look  at  her 
I'll  presently  come  and  take  one  too." 

"I'll  order  your  car  to  the  garden-front,"  Lord 
Theign  added  to  this;  "you'll  reach  it  from  the  saloon, 
but  I'll  see  you  again  first." 

Mr.  Bender  glared  as  with  the  round  full  force  of 
89 


THE  OUTCRY 

his  pair  of  motor  lamps.  "  Well,  if  you're  ready  to  talk 
about  anything,  I  am.  Good-bye,  Mr.  Crimble." 

"Good-bye,  Mr.  Bender."  But  Hugh,  addressing 
their  host  while  his  fellow-guest  returned  to  the  saloon, 
broke  into  the  familiarity  of  confidence.  "As  if  you 
could  be  ready  to  'talk7!" 

This  produced  on  the  part  of  the  others  present 
a  mute  exchange  that  could  only  have  denoted  sur 
prise  at  all  the  irrepressible  young  outsider  thus  pro 
jected  upon  them  took  for  granted.  "I've  an  idea," 
said  Lord  John  to  his  friend,  "that  you're  quite  ready 
to  talk  with  me." 

Hugh  then,  with  his  appetite  so  richly  quickened, 
could  but  rejoice.  "Lady  Grace  spoke  to  me  of 
things  in  the  library." 

"You'll  find  it  that  way"— Lord  Theign  gave  the  in 
dication. 

"Thanks*"  said  Hugh  elatedly,  and  hastened  away. 

Lord  John,  when  he  had  gone,  found  relief  in  a 
quick  comment.  "Very  sharp,  no  doubt — but  he 
wants  taking  down." 

The  master  of  Dedborough  wouldn't  have  put  it  so 
crudely,  but  the  young  expert  did  bring  certain  things 
home.  "The  people  my  daughters,  in  the  exercise 
of  a  wild  freedom,  do  pick  up !" 

"Well,  don't  you  see  that  all  you've  got  to  do — on 
the  question  we're  dealing  with — is  to  claim  your  very 

90 


THE  OUTCRY 

own  wild  freedom?  Surely  I'm  right  in  feeling  you," 
Lord  John  further  remarked,  "  to  have  jumped  at  once 
to  my  idea  that  Bender  is  heaven-sent — and  at  what 
they  call  the  psychologic  moment,  don't  they? — to 
point  that  moral.  Why  look  anywhere  else  for  a  sum 
of  money  that — smaller  or  greater — you  can  find  with 
perfect  ease  in  that  extraordinarily  bulging  pocket?" 

Lord  Theign,  slowly  pacing  the  hall  again,  threw 
up  his  hands.  "Ah,  with  'perfect  ease'  can  scarcely 
be  said!" 

"Why  not? — when  he  absolutely  thrusts  his  dirty 
dollars  down  your  throat." 

" Oh,  I'm  not  talking  of  ease  to  him"  Lord  Theign 
returned — "  I'm  talking  of  ease  to  myself.  I  shall  have 
to  make  a  sacrifice." 

"Why  not  then — for  so  great  a  convenience — gal 
lantly  make  it?" 

"Ah,  my  dear  chap,  if  you  want  me  to  sell  my  Sir 
Joshua !" 

But  the  horror  in  the  words  said  enough,  and  Lord 
John  felt  its  chill.  "I  don't  make  a  point  of  that — 
God  forbid!  But  there  are  other  things  to  which  the 
objection  wouldn't  apply." 

"You  see  how  it  applies — in  the  case  of  the  Moret- 
to — for  him.  A  mere  Moretto,"  said  Lord  Theign, 
"is  too  cheap — for  a  Yankee  'on  the  spend.'  " 

"Then  the  Mantovano  wouldn't  be." 


THE  OUTCRY 

"It  remains  to  be  proved  that  it  is  a  Mantovano." 

"Well,"  said  Lord  John,  "go  into  it." 

"Hanged  if  I  won't!"  his  friend  broke  out  after  a 
moment.  "It  would  suit  me.  I  mean" — the  expla 
nation  came  after  a  brief  intensity  of  thought — "the 
possible  size  of  his  cheque  would." 

"Oh,"  said  Lord  John  gaily,  "I  guess  there's  no 
limit  to  the  possible  size  of  his  cheque!" 

"Yes,  it  would  suit  me,  it  would  suit  me!"  the  elder 
man,  standing  there,  audibly  mused.  But  his  air 
changed  and  a  lighter  question  came  up  to  him  as  he 
saw  his  daughter  reappear  at  the  door  from  the  ter 
race.  "Well,  the  infant  horde?"  he  immediately  put 
to  her. 

Lady  Grace  came  in,  dutifully  accounting  for  them. 
"They've  marched  off — in  a  huge  procession." 

"Thank  goodness!     And  our  friends?" 

"All  playing  tennis,"  she  said — "save  those  who 
are  sitting  it  out."  To  which  she  added,  as  to  explain 
her  return:  "Mr.  Crimble  has  gone?" 

Lord  John  took  upon  him  to  say.  "He's  in  the 
library,  to  which  you  addressed  him — making  discov 
eries." 

"Not  then,  I  hope,"  she  smiled,  "to  our  disadvan 
tage!" 

"To  your  very  great  honour  and  glory."  Lord 
John  clearly  valued  the  effect  he  might  produce. 

92 


THE  OUTCRY 

"  Your  Moretto  of  Brescia — do  you  know  what  it  really 
and  spendidly  is?"  And  then  as  the  girl,  in  her  sur 
prise,  but  wondered:  "A  Mantovano,  neither  more 
nor  less.  Ever  so  much  more  swagger." 

"A  Mantovano?"  Lady  Grace  echoed.  "Why, 
how  tremendously  jolly!" 

Her  father  was  struck.  "Do  you  know  the  artist 
— of  whom  I  had  never  heard?" 

"Yes,  something  of  the  little  that  is  known."  And 
she  rejoiced  as  her  knowledge  came  to  her.  "He's  a 
tremendous  swell,  because,  great  as  he  was,  there  are 
but  seven  proved  examples " 

"With  this  of  yours,"  Lord  John  broke  in,  "there 
are  eight." 

"Then  why  haven't  I  known  about  him?"  Lord 
Theign  put  it  as  if  so  many  other  people  were  guilty 
for  this. 

His  daughter  was  the  first  to  plead  for  the  vague 
body.  "  Why,  I  suppose  in  order  that  you  should  have 
exactly  this  pleasure,  father." 

"Oh,  pleasures  not  desired  are  like  acquaintances 
not  sought — they  rather  bore  one!"  Lord  Theign 
sighed.  With  which  he  moved  away  from  her. 

Her  eyes  followed  him  an  instant — then  she  smiled 
at  their  guest.  "Is  he  bored  at  having  the  higher 
prize — if  you're  sure  it  is  the  higher?" 

"Mr.  Crimble  is  sure — because  if  he  isn't,"  Lord 
John  added,  "he's  a  wretch." 

93 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Well,"  she  returned,  "as  he's  certainly  not  a 
wretch  it  must  be  true.  And  fancy,"  she  exclaimed 
further,  though  as  more  particularly  for  herself,  "our 
having  suddenly  incurred  this  immense  debt  to  him!" 

"Oh,  I  shall  pay  Mr.  Crimble!"  said  her  father, 
who  had  turned  round. 

The  whole  question  appeared  to  have  provoked  in 
Lord  John  a  rise  of  spirits  and  a  flush  of  humour. 
"Don't  you  let  him  stick  it  on." 

His  host,  however,  bethinking  himself,  checked  him. 
"Go  you  to  Mr.  Bender  straight!" 

Lord  John  saw  the  point.  "Yes — till  he  leaves. 
But  I  shall  find  you  here,  shan't  I?"  he  asked  with 
all  earnestness  of  Lady  Grace. 

She  had  an  hesitation,  but  after  a  look  at  her  father 
she  assented.  "I'll  wait  for  you." 

"Then  &  tantot!"  It  made  him  show  for  happy  as, 
waving  his  hand  at  her,  he  proceeded  to  seek  Mr.  Ben 
der  in  presence  of  the  object  that  most  excited  that 
gentleman's  appetite — to  say  nothing  of  the  effect  in 
volved  on  Lord  John's  own. 


IX 


LORD  THEIGN,  when  he  had  gone,  revolved — it 
might  have  been  nervously — about  the  place  a  little, 
but  soon  broke  ground.  "He'll  have  told  you,  I 
understand,  that  I've  promised  to  speak  to  you  for 

94 


THE  OUTCRY 

him.  But  I  understand  also  that  he  has  found  some 
thing  to  say  for  himself." 

"Yes,  we  talked — a  while  since,"  the  girl  said.  " At 
least  he  did." 

"Then  if  you  listened  I  hope  you  listened  with  a 
good  grace." 

"  Oh,  he  speaks  very  well — and  I've  never  disliked 
him." 

It  pulled  her  father  up.  "  Is  that  all — when  I  think 
so  much  of  him  ?" 

She  seemed  to  say  that  she  had,  to  her  own  mind, 
been  liberal  and  gone  far;  but  she  waited  a  little. 
"Do  you  think  very,  very  much?" 

"Surely  I've  made  my  good  opinion  clear  to  you!" 

Again  she  had  a  pause.  "Oh  yes,  I've  seen  you 
like  him  and  believe  in  him — and  I've  found  him  pleas 
ant  and  clever." 

"  He  has  never  had,"  Lord  Theign  more  or  less  in 
geniously  explained,  "what  I  call  a  real  show."  But 
the  character  under  discussion  could  after  all  be 
summed  up  without  searching  analysis.  "I  consider 
nevertheless  that  there's  plenty  in  him." 

It  was  a  moderate  claim,  to  which  Lady  Grace  might 
assent.  "He  strikes  me  as  naturally  quick  and — 
well,  nice.  But  I  agree  with  you  than  he  hasn't  had  a 
chance." 

"Then  if  you  can  see  your  way  by  sympathy  and 
95 


THE  OUTCRY 

confidence  to  help  him  to  one  I  dare  say  you'll  find 
your  reward."  ; 

For  a  third  time  she  considered,  as  if  a  certain  curt- 
ness  in  her  companion's  manner  rather  hindered,  in 
such  a  question,  than  helped.  Didn't  he  simplify  too 
much,  you  would  have  felt  her  ask,  and  wasn't  his  vis 
ible  wish  for  brevity  of  debate  a  sign  of  his  uncomfort 
able  and  indeed  rather  irritated  sense  of  his  not  mak 
ing  a  figure  in  it?  "Do  you  desire  it  very  particu 
larly?"  was,  however,  all  she  at  last  brought  out. 

"I  should  like  it  exceedingly — if  you  act  from  con 
viction.  Then  of  course  only;  but  of  one  thing  I'm 
myself  convinced — of  what  he  thinks  of  yourself  and 
feels  for  you." 

"Then  would  you  mind  my  waiting  a  little?"  she 
asked.  " I  mean  to  be  absolutely  sure  of  myself."  Af 
ter  which,  on  his  delaying  to  agree,  she  added  frankly, 
as  to  help  her  case:  "Upon  my  word,  father,  I  should 
like  to  do  what  would  please  you." 

But  it  determined  in  him  a  sharper  impatience. 
' 'Ah,  what  would  please  me !  Don't  put  it  off  on  c  me ' ! 
Judge  absolutely  for  yourself" — he  slightly  took  him 
self  up — "  in  the  light  of  my  having  consented  to  do  for 
him  what  I  always  hate  to  do :  deviate  from  my  normal 
practice  of  never  intermeddling.  If  I've  deviated  now 
you  can  judge.  But  to  do  so  all  round,  of  course,  take 
— in  reason! — your  time." 


THE  OUTCRY 

"May  I  ask  then,"  she  said,  "for  still  a  little 
more?" 

He  looked  for  this,  verily,  as  if  it  was  not  in  reason. 
"You  know,"  he  then  returned,  "what  he'll  feel  that 
a  sign  of." 

"Well,  I'll  tell  him  what  I  mean." 

"Then  I'll  send  him  to  you." 

He  glanced  at  his  watch  and  was  going,  but  after  a 
"Thanks,  father,"  she  had  stopped  him.  "There's 
one  thing  more. "  An  embarrassment  showed  in  her 
manner,  but  at  the  cost  of  some  effect  of  earnest  ab 
ruptness  she  surmounted  it.  "  What  does  your  Ameri 
can — Mr.  Bender — want?" 

Lord  Theign  plainly  felt  the  challenge.  "'My' 
American?  He's  none  of  mine!" 

"Well  then  Lord  John's." 

"  He's  none  of  his  either — more,  I  mean,  than  any 
one  else's.  He's  every  one's  American,  literally — to 
all  appearance;  and  I've  not  to  tell  you,  surely,  with 
the  freedom  of  your  own  visitors,  how  people  stalk  in 
and  out  here." 

"No,  father — certainly,"  she  said.  "You're  splen 
didly  generous." 

His  eyes  seemed  rather  sharply  to  ask  her  then  how 
he  could  improve  on  that;  but  he  added  as  if  it  were 
enough :  "  What  the  man  must  by  this  time  want  more 
than  anything  else  is  his  car." 

97 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Not  then  anything  of  ours?"  she  still  insisted. 

"Of  'ours'?"  he  echoed  with  a  frown.  "Are  you 
afraid  he  has  an  eye  to  something  of  yours?" 

"Why,  if  we've  a  new  treasure — which  we  certainly 
have  if  we  possess  a  Mantovano — haven't  we  all,  even 
I,  an  immense  interest  in  it?"  And  before  he  could 
answer,  "Is  that  exposed?"  she  asked. 

Lord  Theign,  a  little  unready,  cast  about  at  his 
storied  halls;  any  illusion  to  the  "exposure"  of  the  ob 
jects  they  so  solidly  sheltered  was  obviously  unpleas 
ant  to  him.  But  then  it  was  as  if  he  found  at  a  stroke 
both  his  own  reassurance  and  his  daughter's.  "How 
can  there  be  a  question  of  it  when  he  only  wants  Sir 
Joshuas?" 

"He  wants  ours?"    the  girl  gasped. 

"At  absolutely  any  price." 

"But  you're  not,"  she  cried,  "discussing  it?" 

He  hesitated  as  between  chiding  and  contenting  her 
—then  he  handsomely  chose.  "  My  dear  child,  for  what 
do  you  take  me  ?  "  With  which  he  impatiently  started, 
through  the  long  and  stately  perspective,  for  the  saloon. 

She  sank  into  a  chair  when  he  had  gone;  she  sat 
there  some  moments  in  a  visible  tension  of  thought, 
her  hands  clasped  in  her  lap  and  her  dropped  eyes 
fixed  and  unperceiving;  but  she  sprang  up  as  Hugh 
Crimble,  in  search  of  her,  again  stood  before  her.  He 
presented  himself  as  with  winged  sandals. 

98 


THE  OUTCRY 

"What  luck  to  find  you!  I  must  take  my  spin 
back." 

"You've  seen  everything  as  you  wished?" 

"Oh,"  he  smiled,  "I've  seen  wonders." 

She  showed  her  pleasure.  "Yes,  we've  got  some 
things." 

"So  Mr.  Bender  says!"  he  laughed.  "You've  got 
five  or  six " 

"Only  five  or  six?"  she  cried  in  bright  alarm. 

"'Only'?"  he  continued  to  laugh.  "Why,  that's 
enormous,  five  or  six  things  of  the  first  importance! 
But  I  think  I  ought  to  mention  to  you,"  he  added,  "a 
most  barefaced  '  Rubens'  there  in  the  library." 

"It  isn't  a  Rubens?" 

"No  more  than  I'm  a  Ruskin." 

"  Then  you'll  brand  us — expose  us  for  it  ?" 

"No,  I'll  let  you  off — I'll  be  quiet  if  you're  good,  if 
you  go  straight.  I'll  only  hold  it  in  lerrorem.  One 
can't  be  sure  in  these  dreadful  days — that's  always  to 
remember;  so  that  if  you're  not  good  I'll  come  down 
on  you  with  it.  But  to  balance  against  that  threat," 
he  went  on,  "I've  made  the  very  grandest  find.  At 
least  I  believe  I  have!" 

She  was  all  there  for  this  news.  "Of  the  Manto- 
vano — hidden  in  the  other  thing?" 

Hugh  wondered — almost  as  if  she  had  been  before 
him.  "  You  don't  mean  to  say  you've  had  the  idea  of 
that?" 

99 


THE  OUTCRY 

"No,  but  my  father  has  told  me." 

"And  is  your  father,"  he  eagerly  asked,  "really 
gratified?" 

With  her  conscious  eyes  on  him — her  eyes  could 
clearly  be  very  conscious  about  her  father — she  con 
sidered  a  moment.  "He  always  prefers  old  associa 
tions  and  appearances  to  new;  but  I'm  sure  he'll 
resign  himself  if  you  see  your  way  to  a  certainty." 

"  Well,  it  will  be  a  question  of  the  weight  of  expert 
opinion  that  I  shall  invoke.  But  I'm  not  afraid,"  he 
resolutely  said,  "and  I  shall  make  the  thing,  from  its 
splendid  rarity,  the  crown  and  flower  of  your  glory." 

Her  serious  face  shone  at  him  with  a  charmed  grat 
itude.  "It's  awfully  beautiful  then  your  having  come 
to  us  so.  It's  awfully  beautiful  your  having  brought 
us  this  way,  in  a  flash  —as  dropping  out  of  a  chariot  of 
fire — more  light  and  what  you  apparently  feel  with 
myself  as  more  honour." 

"Ah,  the  beauty's  in  your  having  yourself  done  it!" 
he  returned.  He  gave  way  to  the  positive  joy  of  it. 
"If  I've  brought  the  'light'  and  the  rest— that's  to 
say  the  very  useful  information — who  in  the  world 
was  it  brought  me?" 

She  had  a  gesture  of  protest.  "You'd  have  come 
in  some  other  way." 

"I'm  not  so  sure!  I'm  beastly  shy — little  as  I  may 
seem  to  show  it:  save  in  great  causes,  when  I'm  hor 
ridly  bold  and  hideously  offensive.  Now  at  any  rate  I 

100 


THE  OUTCRY 

only  know  what  has  been."  She  turned  off  for  it,  mov 
ing  away  from  him  as  with  a  sense  of  mingled  things 
that  made  for  unrest;  and  he  had  the  next  moment 
grown  graver  under  the  impression.  "But  does  any 
thing  in  it  all,"  he  asked,  " trouble  you?" 

She  faced  about  across  the  wider  space,  and  there 
was  a  different  note  in  what  she  brought  out.  "I 
don't  know  what  forces  me  so  to  tell  you  things." 

"'Tell'  me?"  he  stared.  "Why,  you've  told  me 
nothing  more  monstrous  than  that  I've  been  wel 
come  !" 

"Well,  however  that  may  be,  what  did  you  mean 
just  now  by  the  chance  of  our  not  'going  straight'? 
When  you  said  you'd  expose  our  bad — or  is  it  our 
false? — Rubens  in  the  event  of  a  certain  danger." 

"Oh,  in  the  event  of  your  ever  being  bribed" — he 
laughed  again  as  with  relief.  And  then  as  her  face 
seemed  to  challenge  the  word:  "Why,  to  let  anything 
— of  your  best! — ever  leave  Dedborough.  By  which 
I  mean  really  of  course  leave  the  country."  She 
turned  again  on  this,  and  something  in  her  air  made 
him  wonder.  "I  hope  you  don't  feel  there  is  such  a 
danger?  I  understood  from  you  half  an  hour  ago 
that  it  was  unthinkable." 

"Well,  it  was,  to  me,  half  an  hour  ago,"  she  said  as 
she  came  nearer.  "But  if  it  has  since  come  up?" 

'"If  it  has !  But  has  it  ?  In  the  form  of  that  mon- 
101 


THE  OUTCRY 

ster?    What  Mr.  Bender  wants  is  the  great  Duchess," 
he  recalled. 

"And  my  father  won't  sell  her?  No,  he  won't  sell 
the  great  Duchess — there  I  feel  safe.  But  he  greatly 
needs  a  certain  sum  of  money — or  he  thinks  he  does — 
and  I've  just  had  a  talk  with  him." 

"In  which  he  has  told  you  that?" 

"He  has  told  me  nothing,"  Lady  Grace  said — "or 
else  told  me  quite  other  things.  But  the  more  I  think 
of  them  the  more  it  comes  to  me  that  he  feels  urged  or 
tempted " 

"To  despoil  and  denude  these  walls?"  Hugh 
broke  in,  looking  about  in  his  sharper  apprehension. 

"Yes,  to  satisfy,  to  save  my  sister.  Now  do  you 
think  our  state  so  ideal?"  she  asked — but  without  ela 
tion  for  her  hint  of  triumph. 

He  had  no  answer  for  this  save  "Ah,  but  you  terri 
bly  interest  me.  May  I  ask  what's  the  matter  with 
your  sister?" 

Oh,  she  wanted  to  go  on  straight  now!  "The  mat 
ter  is — in  the  first  place — that  she's  too  dazzlingly, 
dreadfully  beautiful." 

"More  beautiful  than  you?"  his  sincerity  easily 
risked. 

"Millions  of  times."  Sad,  almost  sombre,  she 
hadn't  a  shade  of  coquetry.  "Kitty  has  debts — 
great  heaped-up  gaming  debts." 

1 02 


THE  OUTCRY 

"But  to  such  amounts?" 

"Incredible  amounts  it  appears.  And  mountains 
of  others  too.  She  throws  herself  all  on  our  father." 

"And  he  has  to  pay  them?  There's  no  one  else?" 
Hugh  asked. 

She  waited  as  if  he  might  answer  himself,  and  then 
as  he  apparently  didn't,  "  He's  only  afraid  there  may 
be  some  else — that's  how  she  makes  him  do  it,"  she 
said.  And  "Now  do  you  think,"  she  pursued,  "that 
I  don't  tell  you  things?" 

He  turned  them  over  in  his  young  perception  and 
pity,  the  things  she  told  him.  "Oh,  oh,  oh!"  And 
then,  in  the  great  place,  while  as,  just  spent  by  the  ef 
fort  of  her  disclosure,  she  moved  from  him  again,  he 
took  them  all  in.  "That's  the  situation  that,  as  you 
say,  may  force  his  hand." 

"It  absolutely,  I  feel,  does  force  it."  And  the  re 
newal  of  her  appeal  brought  her  round.  "Isn't  it  too 
lovely?" 

His  frank  disgust  answered.     "  It's  too  damnable ! ' ' 

"And  it's  you,"  she  quite  terribly  smiled,  "who — by 
the  *  irony  of  fate'! — have  given  him  help." 

He  smote  his  head  in  the  light  of  it.  "  By  the  Man- 
to  vano?" 

"By  the  possible  Mantovano — as  a  substitute  for 
the  impossible  Sir  Joshua.  You've  made  him  aware 
of  a  value." 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Ah,  but  the  value's  to  be  fixed!" 

"Then  Mr.  Bender  will  fix  it!" 

"Oh,  but— as  he  himself  would  say— I'll  fix  Mr. 
Bender!"  Hugh  declared.  "And  he  won't  buy  a  pig 
in  a  poke." 

This  cleared  the  air  while  they  looked  at  each  other; 
yet  she  had  already  asked:  "What  in  the  world  can 
you  do,  and  how  in  the  world  can  you  do  it?" 

Well,  he  was  too  excited  for  decision.  "I  don't 
quite  see  now,  but  give  me  time."  And  he  took  out 
his  watch  as  already  to  measure  it.  "  Oughtn't  I  be 
fore  I  go  to  say  a  word  to  Lord  Theign?" 

"Is  it  your  idea  to  become  a  lion  in  his  path?" 

"Well,  say  a  cub — as  that's  what  I'm  afraid  he'll 
call  me!  But  I  think  I  should  speak  to  him." 

She  drew  a  conclusion  momentarily  dark.  "He'll 
have  to  learn  in  that  case  that  I've  told  you  of  my 
fear." 

"And  is  there  any  good  reason  why  he  shouldn't?" 

She  kept  her  eyes  on  him  and  the  darkness  seemed  to 
clear.  "No!"  she  at  last  replied,  and,  having  gone  to 
touch  an  electric  bell,  was  with  him  again.  "But  I 
think  I'm  rather  sorry  for  you." 

"Does  that  represent  a  reason  why  I  should  be  so 
for  you?" 

For  a  little  she  said  nothing;  but  after  that:  "None 
whatever!" 

104 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Then  is  the  sister  of  whom  you  speak  Lady  Im- 
ber?" 

Lady  Grace,  at  this,  raised  her  hand  in  caution:  the 
butler  had  arrived,  with  due  gravity,  in  answer  to  her 
ring;  to  whom  she  made  known  her  desire.  "Please 
say  to  his  lordship — in  the  saloon  or  wherever — that 
Mr.  Crimble  must  go."  When  Banks  had  departed, 
however,  accepting  the  responsibility  of  this  mission, 
she  answered  her  friend's  question.  "The  sister  of 
whom  I  speak  is  Lady  Imber." 

"She  loses  then  so  heavily  at  bridge?" 

"She  loses  more  than  she  wins." 

Hugh  gazed  as  with  interest  at  these  oddities  of  the 
great.  "And  yet  she  still  plays?" 

"What  else,  in  her  set,  should  she  do?" 

This  he  was  quite  unable  to  say;  but  he  could  after 
a  moment's  exhibition  of  the  extent  to  which  he  was  out 
of  it  put  a  question  instead.  "So  you're  not  in  her 
set?" 

"I'm  not  in  her  set." 

"Then  decidedly,"  he  said,  "I  don't  want  to  save 
her.  I  only  want " 

He  was  going  on,  but  she  broke  in:  "I  know  what 
you  want!" 

He  kept  his  eyes  on  her  till  he  had  made  sure — and 
this  deep  exchange  between  them  had  a  beauty.  "  So 
you're  now  with  me?" 

I05 


THE  OUTCRY 

"I'm  now  with  you!" 

''Then,"  said  Hugh,  "shake  hands  on  it." 

He  offered  her  his  hand,  she  took  it,  and  their  grasp 
became,  as  you  would  have  seen  in  their  fine  young 
faces,  a  pledge  in  which  they  stood  a  minute  locked. 
Lord  Theign  came  upon  them  from  the  saloon  in  the 
midst  of  the  process;  on  which  they  separated  as  with 
an  air  of  its  having  consisted  but  of  Hugh's  leave-tak 
ing.  With  some  such  form  of  mere  civility,  at  any 
rate,  he  appeared,  by  the  manner  in  which  he  ad 
dressed  himself  to  Hugh,  to  have  supposed  them  occu 
pied. 

"I'm  sorry  my  daughter  can't  keep  you;  but  I  must 
at  least  thank  you  for  your  interesting  view  of  my  pic 
ture." 

Hugh  indulged  in  a  brief  and  mute,  though  very 
grave,  acknowledgment  of  this  expression;  presently 
speaking,  however,  as  on  a  resolve  taken  with  a  sense 
of  possibly  awkward  consequences:  "May  I — before 
you're  sure  of  your  indebtedness — put  you  rather  a 
straight  question,  Lord  Theign  ?"  It  sounded  doubt 
less,  and  of  a  sudden,  a  little  portentous — as  was  in 
fact  testified  to  by  his  lordship's  quick  stiff  stare,  full 
of  wonder  at  so  free  a  note.  But  Hugh  had  the  cour 
age  of  his  undertaking.  "  If  I  contribute  in  my  modest 
degree  to  establishing  the  true  authorship  of  the  work 
you  speak  of,  may  I  have  from  you  an  assurance  that 

106 


THE  OUTCRY 

my  success  isn't  to  serve  as  a  basis  for  any  peril — or 
possibility — of  its  leaving  the  country  ?" 

Lord  Theign  was  visibly  astonished,  but  had  also, 
independently  of  this,  turned  a  shade  pale.  "You 
ask  of  me  an  'assurance'?" 

Hugh  had  now,  with  his  firmness  and  his  strained 
smile,  quite  the  look  of  having  counted  the  cost  of  his 
step.  "I'm  afraid  I  must,  you  see." 

It  pressed  at  once  in  his  host  the  spring  of  a  very 
grand  manner.  "  And  pray  by  what  right  here  do  you 
do  anything  of  the  sort?" 

"  By  the  right  of  a  person  from  whom  you,  on  your 
side,  are  accepting  a  service." 

Hugh  had  clearly  determined  in  his  opponent  a  rise 
of  what  is  called  spirit.  "A  service  that  you  half  an 
hour  ago  thrust  on  me,  sir — and  with  which  you  may 
take  it  from  me  that  I'm  already  quite  prepared  to  dis 
pense." 

"I'm  sorry  to  appear  indiscreet,"  our  young  man  re 
turned;  "I'm  sorry  to  have  upset  you  in  any  way. 
But  I  can't  overcome  my  anxiety " 

Lord  Theign  took  the  words  from  his  lips.  "And 
you  therefore  invite  me — at  the  end  of  half  an  hour  in 
this  house! — to  account  to  you  for  my  personal  in 
tentions  and  my  private  affairs  and  make  over  my  free 
dom  to  your  hands?" 

Hugh  stood  there  with  his  eyes  on  the  black  and  white 
107 


THE  OUTCRY 

pavement  that  stretched  about  him — the  great  loz- 
enged  marble  floor  that  might  have  figured  that  ground 
of  his  own  vision  which  he  had  made  up  his  mind  to 
"stand."  "I  can  only  see  the  matter  as  I  see  it,  and 
I  should  be  ashamed  not  to  have  seized  any  chance  to 
appeal  to  you."  Whatever  difficulty  he  had  had  shyly 
to  face  didn't  exist  for  him  now.  "I  entreat  you  to 
think  again,  to  think  well,  before  you  deprive  us  of 
such  a  source  of  just  envy." 

"And  you  regard  your  entreaty  as  helped,"  Lord 
Theign  asked,  "by  the  beautiful  threat  you  are  so  good 
as  to  attach  to  it?"  Then  as  his  monitor,  arrested, 
exchanged  a  searching  look  with  Lady  Grace,  who, 
showing  in  her  face  all  the  pain  of  the  business,  stood 
off  at  the  distance  to  which  a  woman  instinctively 
retreats  when  a  scene  turns  to  violence  as  precipitately 
as  this  one  appeared  to  strike  her  as  having  turned: 
"I  ask  you  that  not  less  than  I  should  like  to  know 
whom  you  speak  of  as  'deprived'  of  property  that  hap 
pens — for  reasons  that  I  don't  suppose  you  also  quar 
rel  with! — to  be  mine." 

"  Well,  I  know  nothing  about  threats,  Lord  Theign," 
Hugh  said,  "  but  I  speak  of  all  of  us — of  all  the  people 
of  England;  who  would  deeply  deplore  such  an  act  of 
alienation,  and  whom,  for  the  interest  they  bear  you, 
I  beseech  you  mercifully  to  consider." 

"The  interest  they  bear  me?"— the  master  of  Ded- 
108 


THE  OUTCRY 

borough  fairly  bristled  with  wonder.  "  Pray  how  the 
devil  do  they  show  it?" 

"I  think  they  show  it  in  all  sorts  of  ways" — and 
Hugh's  critical  smile,  at  almost  any  moment  hovering, 
played  over  the  question  in  a  manner  seeming  to  con 
vey  that  he  meant  many  things. 

"Understand  then,  please,"  said  Lord  Theign  with 
every  inch  of  his  authority,  "that  they'll  show  it  best 
by  minding  their  own  business  while  I  very  particu 
larly  mind  mine." 

"You  simply  do,  in  other  words,"  Hugh  explicitly 
concluded,  "what  happens  to  be  convenient  to  you." 

"In  very  distinct  preference  to  what  happens  to  be 
convenient  to  you!  So  that  I  need  no  longer  detain 
you,"  Lord  Theign  added  with  the  last  dryness  and 
as  if  to  wind  up  their  brief  and  thankless  connec 
tion. 

The  young  man  took  his  dismissal,  being  able  to  do 
no  less,  while,  unsatisfied  and  unhappy,  he  looked 
about  mechanically  for  the  cycling-cap  he  had  laid 
down  somewhere  in  the  hall  on  his  arrival.  "  I  apolo 
gise,  my  lord,  if  I  seem  to  you  to  have  ill  repaid  your 
hospitality.  But,"  he  went  on  with  his  uncommended 
cheer,  "my  interest  in  your  picture  remains." 

Lady  Grace,  who  had  stopped  and  strayed  and 
stopped  again  as  a  mere  watchful  witness,  drew  nearer 
hereupon,  breaking  her  silence  for  the  first  time.  "  And 

109 


THE  OUTCRY 

please  let  me  say,  father,  that  mine  also  grows  and 
grows." 

It  was  obvious  that  this  parent,  surprised  and  discon 
certed  by  her  tone,  judged  her  contribution  super 
fluous.  "I'm  happy  to  hear  it,  Grace — but  yours  is 
another  affair." 

"I  think  on  the  contrary  that  it's  quite  the  same 
one,"  she  returned — "since  it's  on  my  hint  to  him  that 
Mr.  Crimble  has  said  to  you  what  he  has."  The  res 
olution  she  had  gathered  while  she  awaited  her  chance 
sat  in  her  charming  eyes,  which  met,  as  she  spoke,  the 
straighter  paternal  glare.  "  I  let  him  know  that  I  sup 
posed  you  to  think  of  profiting  by  the  importance  of 
Mr.  Bender's  visit." 

"Then  you  might  have  spared,  my  dear,  your — I 
suppose  and  hope  well-meant — interpretation  of  my 
mind."  Lord  Theign  showed  himself  at  this  point 
master  of  the  beautiful  art  of  righting  himself  as  with 
out  having  been  in  the  wrong.  "Mr.  Bender's  visit 
will  terminate — as  soon  as  he  has  released  Lord  John— 
without  my  having  profited  in  the  smallest  particular." 

Hugh  meanwhile  evidently  but  wanted  to  speak  for 
his  friend.  "It  was  Lady  Grace's  anxious  inference, 
she  will  doubtless  let  me  say  for  her,  that  my  idea  about 
the  Moretto  would  add  to  your  power — well,"  he 
pushed  on  not  without  awkwardness,  "of  'realising' 
advantageously  on  such  a  prospective  rise." 

no 


THE  OUTCRY 

Lord  Theign  glanced  at  him  as  for  positively  the 
last  time,  but  spoke  to  Lady  Grace.  "Understand 
then,  please,  that,  as  I  detach  myself  from  any  associ 
ation  with  this  gentleman's  ideas — whether  about  the 
Moretto  or  about  anything  else — his  further  applica 
tion  of  them  ceases  from  this  moment  to  concern  us." 

The  girl's  rejoinder  was  to  address  herself  directly 
to  Hugh,  across  their  companion.  "Will  you  make 
your  inquiry  for  me  then?" 

The  light  again  kindled  in  him.  "With  all  the 
pleasure  in  life!"  He  had  found  his  cap  and,  taking 
them  together,  bowed  to  the  two,  for  departure,  with 
high  emphasis  of  form.  Then  he  marched  off  in  the 
direction  from  which  he  had  entered. 

Lord  Theign  scarce  waited  for  his  disappearance 
to  turn  in  wrath  to  Lady  Grace.  "I  denounce  the 
indecency,  wretched  child,  of  your  public  defiance  of 
me!" 

They  were  separated  by  a  wide  interval  now,  and 
though  at  her  distance  she  met  his  reproof  so  unshrink 
ingly  as  perhaps  to  justify  the  terms  into  which  it  had 
broken,  she  became  aware  of  a  reason  for  his  not  fol 
lowing  it  up.  She  pronounced  in  quick  warning 
"Lord  John!" — for  their  friend,  released  from  among 
the  pictures,  was  rejoining  them,  was  already  there. 

He  spoke  straight  to  his  host  on  coming  into  sight. 
"Bender's  at  last  off,  but" — he  indicated  the  direction 

in 


THE  OUTCRY 

of  the  garden  front — uyou  may  still  find  him,  out 
yonder,  prolonging  the  agony  with  Lady  Sand- 
gate." 

Lord  Theign  remained  a  moment,  and  the  heat  of 
his  resentment  remained.  He  looked  with  a  divided 
discretion,  the  pain  of  his  indecision,  from  his  daugh 
ter's  suitor  and  his  approved  candidate  to  that 
contumacious  young  woman  and  back  again;  then 
choosing  his  course  in  silence  he  had  a  gesture  of  al 
most  desperate  indifference  and  passed  quickly  out  by 
the  door  to  the  terrace. 

It  had  left  Lord  John  gaping.  "What  on  earth's 
the  matter  with  your  father?" 

"What  on  earth  indeed?"  Lady  Grace  unaidingly 
asked.  "Is  he  discussing  with  that  awful  man?" 

"  Old  Bender  ?  Do  you  think  him  so  awful  ?  "  Lord 
John  showed  surprise — which  might  indeed  have 
passed  for  harmless  amusement;  but  he  shook  every 
thing  off  in  view  of  a  nearer  interest.  He  quite 
waved  old  Bender  away.  "  My  dear  girl,  what  do  we 
care ?" 

"I  care  immensely,  I  assure  you,"  she  interrupted, 
"and  I  ask  of  you,  please,  to  tell  me!" 

Her  perversity,  coming  straight  and  which  he  had 
so  little  expected,  threw  him  back  so  that  he  looked  at 
her  with  sombre  eyes.  "Ah,  it's  not  for  such  a  mat 
ter  I'm  here,  Lady  Grace — I'm  here  with  that  fond 

112 


THE  OUTCRY 

question  of  my  own."  And  then  as  she  turned  away, 
leaving  him  with  a  vehement  motion  of  protest:  "I've 
come. for  your  kind  answer — the  answer  your  father 
instructed  me  to  count  on."  . 

"I've  no  kind  answer  to  give  you!" — she  raised 
forbidding  hands.  "I  entreat  you  to  leave  me 
alone." 

There  was  so  high  a  spirit  and  so  strong  a  force  in 
it  that  he  stared  as  if  stricken  by  violence.  "In  God's 
name  then  what  has  happened — when  you  almost 
gave  me  your  word?" 

"What  has  happened  is  that  I've  found  it  impossi 
ble  to  listen  to  you."  And  she  moved  as  if  fleeing 
she  scarce  knew  whither  before  him. 

He  had  already  hastened  around  another  way,  how 
ever,  as  to  meet  her  in  her  quick  circuit  of  the  hall. 
"That's  all  you've  got  to  say  to  me  after  what  has 
passed  between  us?" 

He  had  stopped  her  thus,  but  she  had  also  stopped 
him,  and  her  passionate  denial  set  him  a  limit.  "I've 
got  to  say — sorry  as  I  am — that  if  you  must  have  an 
answer  it's  this:  that  never,  Lord  John,  never,  can 
there  be  anything  more  between  us."  And  her  ges 
ture  cleared  her  path,  permitting  her  to  achieve  her 
flight.  "Never,  no,  never,"  she  repeated  as  she  went 
— "never,  never,  never!"  She  got  off  by  the  door  at 
which  she  had  been  aiming  to  some  retreat  of  her  own, 


THE  OUTCRY 

while  aghast  and  defeated,  left  to  make  the  best  of  it, 
he  sank  after  a  moment  into  a  chair  and  remained 
quite  pitiably  staring  before  him,  appealing  to  the 
great  blank  splendour. 


114 


BOOK  SECOND 


TADY  SANDGATE,  on  a  morning  late  in  May, 
••— '  entered  her  drawing-room  by  the  door  that  opened 
at  the  right  of  that  charming  retreat  as  a  person  com 
ing  in  faced  Bruton  Street;  and  she  met  there  at  this 
moment  Mr.  Gotch,  her  butler,  who  had  just  appeared 
in  the  much  wider  doorway  forming  opposite  the  Bru 
ton  Street  windows  an  apartment  not  less  ample, 
lighted  from  the  back  of  the  house  and  having  its 
independent  connection  with  the  upper  floors  and  the 
lower.  She  showed  surprise  at  not  immediately  find 
ing  the  visitor  to  whom  she  had  been  called. 

"But  Mr.  Crimble ?" 

"  Here  he  is,  my  lady."  And  he  made  way  for  that 
gentleman,  who  emerged  from  the  back  room;  Gotch 
observing  the  propriety  of  a  prompt  withdrawal. 

"I  went  in  fora  minute,  with  your  servant's  permis 
sion,"  Hugh  explained,  "to  see  your  famous  Lawrence 
— which  is  splendid;  he  was  so  good  as  to  arrange  the 
light."  The  young  man's  dress  was  of  a  form  less  re 
laxed  than  on  the  occasion  of  his  visit  to  Dedborough; 
yet  the  soft  felt  hat  that  he  rather  restlessly  crumpled 
as  he  talked  marked  the  limit  of  his  sacrifice  to  vain 
appearances. 

117 


THE  OUTCRY 

Lady  Sandgate  was  at  once  interested  in  the  punctu 
ality  of  his  reported  act.  "  Gotch  thinks  as  much  of 
my  grandmother  as  I  do — and  even  seems  to  have 
ended  by  taking  her  for  his  very  own." 

"  One  sees,  unmistakably,  from  her  beauty,  that  you 
at  any  rate  are  of  her  line,"  Hugh  allowed  himself, 
not  without  confidence,  the  amusement  of  replying; 
"and  I  must  make  sure  of  another  look  at  her  when 
I've  a  good  deal  more  time." 

His  hostess  heard  him  as  with  a  lapse  of  hope.  "  You 
hadn't  then  come  for  the  poor  dear  ?  "  And  then  as  he 
obviously  hadn't,  but  for  something  quite  else:  "I 
thought,  from  so  prompt  an  interest,  that  she  might 
be  coveted — !"  It  dropped  with  a  yearning  sigh. 

"You  imagined  me  sent  by  some  prowling  col 
lector?"  Hugh  asked.  "Ah,  I  shall  never  do  their 
work — unless  to  betray  them:  that  I  shouldn't  in  the 
least  mind! — and  I'm  here,  frankly,  at  this  early  hour, 
to  ask  your  consent  to  my  seeing  Lady  Grace  a  moment 
on  a  particular  business,  if  she  can  kindly  give  me 
time." 

"You've  known  then  of  her  being  with  me?" 

"  I've  known  of  her  coming  to  you  straight  on  leaving 
Dedborough,"  he  explained;  "of  her  wishing  not  to 
go  to  her  sister's,  and  of  Lord  Theign's  having  pro 
ceeded,  as  they  say,  or  being  on  the  point  of  proceeding, 
to  some  foreign  part." 

118 


THE  OUTCRY 

"And  you've  learnt  it  from  having  seen  her — these 
three  or  four  weeks?" 

"Fve  met  her — but  just  barely — two  or  three  times: 
at  a  '  private  view/  at  the  opera,  in  the  lobby,  and 
that  sort  of  thing.  But  she  hasn't  told  you?" 

Lady  Sandgate  neither  affirmed  nor  denied;    she 

N  only  turned  on  him  her  thick  lustre.     "I  wanted  to 

see  how  much  you'd  tell."     She  waited  even  as  for 

more,  but  this  not  coming  she  helped  herself.     "  Once 

again  at  dinner?" 

"Yes,  but  alas  not  near  her!" 

"Once  then  at  a  private  view? — when,  with  the 
squash  they  usually  are,  you  might  have  been  very  near 
her  indeed!" 

The  young  man,  his  hilarity  quickened,  took  but  a 
moment  for  the  truth.  "Yes — it  was  a  squash!" 

"And  once,"  his  hostess  pursued,  "in  the  lobby  of 
the  opera?" 

"After  'Tristan' — yes;  but  with  some  awful  grand 
people  I  didn't  know." 

She  recognised;  she  estimated  the  grandeur.  "Oh, 
the  Pennimans_ are  nobody!  But  now,"  she  asked, 
"you've  come,  you  say,  on  'business'?" 

"Very  important,  please — which  accounts  for  the 
hour  I've  ventured  and  the  appearance  I  present." 

"I  don't  ask  you  too  much  to  'account,'"  Lady 
Sandgate  kindly  said;  "but  I  can't  not  wonder  if  she 
hasn't  told  you  what  things  have  happened." 

119 


THE  OUTCRY 

He  cast  about.  "  She  has  had  no  chance  to  tell  me 
anything — beyond  the  fact  of  her  being  here." 

"Without  the  reason?" 

"'The  reason'?"  he  echoed. 

She  gave  it  up,  going  straighter.  "She's  with  me 
then  as  an  old  firm  friend.  Under  my  care  and  protec 
tion." 

"I  see" — he  took  it,  with  more  penetration  than  en 
thusiasm,  as  a  hint  in  respect  to  himself.  "She  puts 
you  on  your  guard." 

Lady  Sandgate  expressed  it  more  graciously.  "  She 
puts  me  on  my  honour — or  at  least  her  father  does." 

"As  to  her  seeing  me?" 

"As  to  my  seeing  at  least — what  may  happen  to  her." 

"Because — you  say — things  have  happened?" 

His  companion  fairly  sounded  him.  "You've  only 
talked — when  you've  met — of  'art'?" 

"Well,"  he  smiled,  "'art  is  long'!" 

"Then  I  hope  it  may  see  you  through!  But  you 
should  know  first  that  Lord  Theign  is  presently 
due " 

"Here,  back  already  from  abroad?" — he  was  all 
alert. 

"He  has  not  yet  gone — he  comes  up  this  morning 
to  start." 

"And  stops  here  on  his  way?" 

"To  take  the  train  de  luxe  this  afternoon  to  his  an 
nual  Salsomaggiore.  But  with  so  little  time  to  spare," 

1 20 


THE  OUTCRY 

she  went  on  reassuringly,  "that,  to  simplify — as  he 
wired  me  an  hour  ago  from  Dedborough — he  has  given 
rendezvous  here  to  Mr.  Bender,  who  is  particularly 
to  wait  for  him." 

"And  who  may  therefore  arrive  at  any  moment ?" 

She  looked  at  her  bracelet  watch.  "Scarcely  be 
fore  noon.  So  you'll  just  have  your  chance " 

"Thank  the  powers  then!" — Hugh  grasped  at  it. 
"I  shall  have  it  best  if  you'll  be  so  good  as  to  tell 
me  first — well,"  he  faltered,  "what  it  is  that,  to  my 
great  disquiet,  you've  further  alluded  to;  what  it  is 
that  has  occurred." 

Lady  Sandgate  took  her  time,  but  her  good-nature 
and  other  sentiments  pronounced.  "Haven't  you  at 
least  guessed  that  she  has  fallen  under  her  father's 
extreme  reprobation?" 

"  Yes,  so  much  as  that — that  she  must  have  greatly 
annoyed  him— I  have  been  supposing.  But  isn't  it 
by  her  having  asked  me  to  act  for  her  ?  I  mean  about 
the  Mantovano — which  I  have  done." 

Lady  Sandgate  wondered.     "You've  ' acted'?" 

"It's  what  I've  come  to  tell  her  at  last — and  I'm 
all  impatience." 

"I  see,  I  see" — she  had  caught  a  clue.  "He  hated 
that— yes;  but  you  haven't  really  made  out,"  she  put 
to  him,  "  the  other  effect  of  your  hour  at  Dedborough  ?  " 
She  recognised,  however,  while  she  spoke,  that  his  div- 

121 


THE  OUTCRY 

ination  had  failed,  and  she  didn't  trouble  him  to  con 
fess  it.  "Directly  you  had  gone  she  ' turned  down' 
Lord  John.  Declined,  I  mean,  the  offer  of  his  hand  in 
marriage." 

Hugh  was  clearly  as  much  mystified  as  anything 
else.  "  He  proposed  there ?  " 

"  He  had  spoken,  that  day,  before — before  your  talk 
with  Lord  Theign,  who  had  every  confidence  in  her 
accepting  him.  But  you  came,  Mr.  Crimble,  you 
went;  and  when  her  suitor  reappeared,  just  after  you 
had  gone,  for  his  answer " 

"  She  wouldn't  have  him  ?"  Hugh  asked  with  a  pre 
cipitation  of  interest. 

But  Lady  Sandgate  could  humour  almost  any  curi 
osity.  "She  wouldn't  look  at  him." 

He  bethought  himself.  "But  had  she  said  she 
would?" 

"So  her  father  indignantly  considers." 

"That's  the  ground  of  his  indignation?" 

"He  had  his  reasons  for  counting  on  her,  and  it  has 
determined  a  painful  crisis." 

Hugh  Crimble  turned  this  over — feeling  apparently 
for  something  he  didn't  find.  "I'm  sorry  to  hear  such 
things,  but  where's  the  connection  with  me?" 

"Ah,  you  know  best  yourself,  and  if  you  don't  see 
any — !"  In  that  case,  Lady  Sandgate's  motion  im 
plied,  she  washed  her  hands  of  it. 

122 


THE  OUTCRY 

Hugh  had  for  a  moment  the  air  of  a  young  man 
treated  to  the  sweet  chance  to  guess  a  conundrum — 
which  he  gave  up.  "I  really  don't  see  any,  Lady 
Sandgate.  But,"  he  a  little  inconsistently  said,  "I'm 
greatly  obliged  to  you  for  telling  me." 

"Don't  mention  it! — though  I  think  it  is  good  of 
me,"  she  smiled,  "on  so  short  an  acquaintance."  To 
which  she  added  more  gravely:  "I  leave  you  the  situ 
ation — but  I'm  willing  to  let  you  know  that  I'm  all  on 
Grace's  side." 

"So  am  I,  rather! — please  let  me  frankly  say." 

He  clearly  refreshed,  he  even  almost  charmed  her. 
"It's  the  very  least  you  can  say! — though  I'm  not  sure 
whether  you  say  it  as  the  simplest  or  as  the  very  subt 
lest  of  men.  But  in  case  you  don't  know  as  I  do  how 
little  the  particular  candidate  I've  named " 

"Had  a  right  or  a  claim  to  succeed  with  her?"  he 
broke  in — all  quick  intelligence  here  at  least.  "No, 
I  don't  perhaps  know  as  well  as  you  do — but  I  think 
I  know  as  well  as  I  just  yet  require." 

"There  you  are  then!  And  if  you  did  prevent," 
his  hostess  maturely  pursued,  "what  wouldn't  have 
been — well,  good  or  nice,  I'm  quite  on  your  side  too." 

Our  young  man  seemed  to  feel  the  shade  of  ambigu 
ity,  but  he  reached  at  a  meaning.  "You're  with  me 
in  my  plea  for  our  defending  at  any  cost  of  effort  or 
ingenuity — — " 

123 


THE  OUTCRY 

"The  precious  picture  Lord  Theign  exposes?" — 
she  took  his  presumed  sense  faster  than  he  had  taken 
hers.  But  she  hung  fire  a  moment  with  her  reply  to 
it.  "  Well,  will  you  keep  the  secret  of  everything  I've 
said  or  say?" 

"To  the  death,  to  the  stake,  Lady  Sandgate!" 

"Then,"  she  momentously  returned,  "I  only  want, 
too,  to  make  Bender  impossible.  If  you  ask  me,"  she 
pursued,  "how  I  arrange  that  with  my  deep  loyalty 
to  Lord  Theign " 

"I  don't  ask  you  anything  of  the  sort,"  he  inter 
rupted — "I  wouldn't  ask  you  for  the  world;  and  my 
own  bright  plan  for  achieving  the  coup  you  men 
tion " 

"You'll  have  time,  at  the  most,"  she  said,  consulting 
afresh  her  bracelet  watch,  "  to  explain  to  Lady  Grace." 
She  reached  an  electric  bell,  which  she  touched — fa 
cing  then  her  visitor  again  with  an  abrupt  and  slightly 
embarrassed  change  of  tone.  "  You  do  think  my  great 
portrait  splendid?" 

He  had  strayed  far  from  it  and  all  too  languidly 
came  back.  "Your  Lawrence  there?  As  I  said, 
magnificent." 

But  the  butler  had  come  in,  interrupting,  straight 
from  the  lobby;  of  whom  she  made  her  request.  "  Let 
her  ladyship  know — Mr.  Crimble." 

Gotch  looked  hard  at  Hugh  and  the  crumpled  hat 
124 


THE  OUTCRY 

— almost  as  if  having  an  option.  But  he  resigned  him 
self  to  repeating,  with  a  distinctness  that  scarce  fell 
short  of  the  invidious,  "Mr.  Crimble,"  and  departed 
on  his  errand. 

Lady  Sandgate's  fair  flush  of  diplomacy  had  mean 
while  not  faded.  "  Couldn't  you,  with  your  immense 
cleverness  and  power,  get  the  Government  to  do  some 
thing  ?" 

"  About  your  picture  ?  "  Hugh  betrayed  on  this  head 
a  graceless  detachment.  "You  too  then  want  to 
sell?" 

Oh  she  righted  herself.     "  Never  to  a  private  party ! " 

"Mr.  Bender's  not  after  it?"  he  asked— though 
scarce  lighting  his  reluctant  interest  with  a  forced 
smile. 

"Most  intensely  after  it.  But  never,"  cried  the 
proprietress,  "to  a  bloated  alien!" 

"Then  I  applaud  your  patriotism.  "Only  why 
not,"  he  asked,  "carrying  that  magnanimity  a  little 
further,  set  us  all  an  example  as  splendid  as  the  ob 
ject  itself?" 

"  Give  it  you  for  nothing?"  She  threw  up  shocked 
hands.  "Because  I'm  an  aged  female  pauper  and 
can't  make  every  sacrifice." 

Hugh  pretended — none  too  convincingly — to  think. 
"Will  you  let  them  have  it  very  cheap?" 

"Yes — for  less  than  such  a  bribe  as  Bender's." 
125 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Ah,"  he  said  expressively,  "that  might  be,  and 
still !" 

Well,  "she  had  a  flare  of  fond  confidence.  "I'll 
find  out  what  he'll  offer — if  you'll  on  your  side  do  what 
you  can — and  then  ask  them  a  third  less."  And  she 
followed  it  up — as  if  suddenly  conceiving  him  a  prig. 
"  See  here,  Mr.  Crimble,  I've  been — and  this  very  first 
time! — charming  to  you." 

"You  have  indeed,"  he  returned;  "but  you  throw 
back  on  it  a  lurid  light  if  it  has  all  been  for  that!" 

"It  has  been — well,  to  keep  things  as  I  want  them; 
and  if  I've  given  you  precious  information  mightn't 
you  on  your  side " 

"Estimate  its  value  in  cash?" — Hugh  sharply  took 
her  up.  "Ah,  Lady  Sandgate,  I  am  in  your  debt,  but 
if  you  really  bargain  for  your  precious  information  I'd 
rather  we  assume  that  I  haven't  enjoyed  it." 

She  made  him,  however,  in  reply,  a  sign  for  silence; 
she  had  heard  Lady  Grace  enter  the  other  room  from 
the  back  landing,  and,  reaching  the  nearer  door,  she 
disposed  of  the  question  with  high  gay  bravery.  "I 
won't  bargain  with  the  Treasury !  "—she  had  passed  out 
by  the  time  Lady  Grace  arrived. 


126 


THE  OUTCRY 


II 


As  Hugh  recognised  in  this  friend's  entrance  and 
face  the  light  of  welcome  he  went,  full  of  his  subject, 
straight  to  their  main  affair.  "I  haven't  been  able  to 
wait,  I've  wanted  so  much  to  tell  you — I  mean  how  I've 
just  come  back  from  Brussels,  where  I  saw  Pappen- 
dick,  who  was  free  and  ready,  by  the  happiest  chance, 
to  start  for  Verona,  which  he  must  have  reached  some 
time  yesterday." 

.The  girl's  responsive  interest  fairly  broke  into  rap 
ture.  "Ah,  the  dear  sweet  thing!" 

"Yes,  he's  a  brick — but  the  question  now  hangs  in 
the  balance.  Allowing  him  time  to  have  got  into  rela 
tion  with  the  picture,  I've  begun  to  expect  his  wire, 
which  will  probably  come  to  my  club;  but  my  fidget, 
while  I  wait,  has  driven  me" — he  threw  out  and 
dropped  his  arms  in  expression  of  his  soft  surrender 
— "well,  just  to  do  this:  to  come  to  you  here,  in  my 
fever,  at  an  unnatural  hour  and  uninvited,  and  at  least 
let  you  know  I've  'acted.'" 

"Oh,  but  I  simply  rejoice,"  Lady  Grace  declared, 
"to  be  acting  with  you." 

"Then  if  you  are,  if  you  are"  the  young  man  cried, 
"why  everything's  beautiful  and  right!" 

"It's  all  I  care  for  and  think  of  now,"  she  went  on 
127 


THE  OUTCRY 

in  her  bright  devotion,  "and  I've  only  wondered  and 
hoped !" 

Well,  Hugh  found  for  it  all  a  rapid,  abundant  lu 
cidity.  "  He  was  away  from  home  at  first,  and  I  had  to 
wait— but  I  crossed  last  week,  found  him  and  settled  it; 
coming  home  by  Paris,  where  I  had  a  grand  four  days' 
jaw  with  the  fellows  there  and  saw  their  great  specimen 
of  our  master:  all  of  which  has  given  him  time." 

"And  now  his  time's  up?"   the  girl  eagerly  asked. 

"It  must  be — and  we  shall  see."  But  Hugh  post 
poned  that  question  to  a  matter  of  more  moment  still. 
"The  thing  is  that  at  last  I'm  able  to  tell  you  how  I 
feel  the  trouble  I've  brought  you." 

It  made  her,  quickly  colouring,  rest  grave  eyes  on 
him.  "What  do  you  know — when  I  haven't  told  you 
—about  my  'trouble'?" 

"Can't  I  have  guessed,  with  a  ray  of  intelligence?" 
— he  had  his  answer  ready.  "You've  sought  asylum 
with  this  good  friend  from  the  effects  of  your  father's  re 
sentment." 

"'Sought  asylum'  is  perhaps  excessive,"  Lady 
Grace  returned — "though  it  wasn't  pleasant  with  him 
after  that  hour,  no,"  she  allowed.  "And  I  couldn't 
go,  you  see,  to  Kitty." 

"No  indeed,  you  couldn't  go  to  Kitty."  He  smiled 
at  her  hard  as  he  added:  "I  should  have  liked  to 
see  you  go  to  Kitty!  Therefore  exactly  is  it  that  I've 

128 


THE  OUTCRY 

set  you  adrift— that  I've  darkened  and  poisoned  your 
days.  You're  paying  with  your  comfort,  with  your 
peace,  for  having  joined  so  gallantly  in  my  grand  re 
monstrance." 

She  shook  her  head,  turning  from  him,  but  then 
turned  back  again — as  if  accepting,  as  if  even  relieved 
by,  this  version  of  the  prime  cause  of  her  state.  "  Why 
do  you  talk  of  it  as  'paying'— if  it's  all  to  come  back  to 
my  being  paid  ?  I  mean  by  your  blest  success — if  you 
really  do  what  you  want." 

"I  have  your  word  for  it,"  he  searchingly  said, 
"that  our  really  pulling  it  off  together  will  make  up 
to  you ?" 

"I  should  be  ashamed  if  it  didn't,  for  everything!" 
— she  took  the  question  from  his  mouth.  "I  believe 
in  such  a  cause  exactly  as  you  do — and  found  a  lesson, 
at  Dedborough,  in  your  frankness  and  your  faith." 

"Then  you'll  help  me  no  end,"  he  said  all  simply 
and  sincerely. 

"You've  helped  me  already" — that  she  gave  him 
straight  back.  And  on  it  they  stayed  a  moment,  their 
strenuous  faces  more  intensely  communing. 

"You're  very  wonderful — for  a  girl!"  Hugh  brought 
out. 

"  One  has  to  be  a  girl,  naturally,  to  be  a  daughter  of 
one's  house,"  she  laughed;  "and  that's  all  I  am  of  ours 
— but  a  true  and  a  right  and  a  straight  one." 

129 


THE  OUTCRY 

He  glowed  with  his  admiration.  "You're  splen 
did!" 

That  might  be  or  not,  her  light  shrug  intimated;  she 
gave  it,  at  any  rate,  the  go-by  and  more  exactly  stated 
her  case.  "  I  see  our  situation." 

"So  do  I,  Lady  Grace!"  he  cried  with  the  strongest 
emphasis.  "And  your  father  only  doesn't." 

"Yes,"  she  said  for  intelligent  correction — "he  sees 
it,  there's  nothing  in  life  he  sees  so  much.  But  un 
fortunately  he  sees  it  all  wrong." 

Hugh  seized  her  point  of  view  as  if  there  had  been 
nothing  of  her  that  he  wouldn't  have  seized.  "He 
sees  it  all  wrong  then!  My  appeal  the  other  day  he 
took  as  a  rude  protest.  And  any  protest " 

"Any  protest,"  she  quickly  and  fully  agreed,  "he 
takes  as  an  offence,  yes.  It's  his  theory  that  he  still 
has  rights,"  she  smiled,  "though  he  is  a  miserable 
peer." 

"  How  should  he  not  have  rights,"  said  Hugh,  "  when 
he  has  really  everything  on  earth?" 

"Ah,  he  doesn't  even  know  that — he  takes  it  so  much 
for  granted."  And  she  sought,  though  as  rather  sadly 
and  despairingly,  to  explain.  "  He  lives  all  in  his  own 
world." 

"He  lives  all  in  his  own,  yes;  but  he  does  business  all 
in  ours — quite  as  much  as  the  people  who  come  up  to 
the  city  in  the  Tube."  With  which  Hugh  had  a  still 

130 


THE  OUTCRY 

sharper  recall  of  the  stiff  actual.  "And  he  must  be 
here  to  do  business  to-day." 

"You  know,"  Lady  Grace  asked,  "that  he's  to  meet 
Mr.  Bender?" 

"Lady  Sandgate  kindly  warned  me,  and,"  her  com 
panion  saw  as  he  glanced  at  the  clock  on  the  chimney, 
"  I've  only  ten  minutes,  at  best.  The  'Journal '  won't 
have  been  good  for  him,"  he  added — "you  doubtless 
have  seen  the  'Journal'?" 

"  No  " — she  was  vague.  "  We  live  by  the  '  Morning 
Post.1" 

"That's  why  our  friend  here  didn't  speak  then," 
Hugh  said  with  a  better  light — "which,  out  of  a  dim 
consideration  for  her,  I  didn't  do,  either.  But  they've 
a  leader  this  morning  about  Lady  Lappington  and 
her  Longhi,  and  on  Bender  and  his  hauls,  and  on  the 
certainty — if  we  don't  do  something  energetic — of  more 
and  more  Benders  to  come:  such  a  conquering  horde 
as  invaded  the  old  civilisation,  only  armed  now  with 
huge  cheque-books  instead  of  with  spears  and  battle- 
axes.  They  refer  to  the  rumour  current — as  too  hor 
rific  to  believe — of  Lord  Theign's  putting  up  his  Mo- 
retto;  with  the  question  of  how  properly  to  qualify  any 
such  sad  purpose  in  him  should  the  further  report 
prove  true  of  a  new  and  momentous  opinion  about 
the  picture  entertained  by  several  eminent  authori 
ties." 


THE  OUTCRY 

"  Of  whom/'  said  the  girl,  intensely  attached  to  this 
recital,  "you're  of  course  seen  as  not  the  least." 

"Of  whom,  of  course,  Lady  Grace,  I'm  as  yet — 
however  I'm  'seen' — the  whole  collection.  But  we've 
time" — he  rested  on  that.  "The  fat,  if  you'll  allow 
me  the  expression,  is  on  the  fire — which,  as  I  see  the 
matter,  is  where  this  particular  fat  should  be." 

"Is  the  article,  then,"  his  companion  appealed, 
"very  severe?" 

"  I  prefer  to  call  it  very  enlightened  and  very  intelli 
gent — and  the  great  thing  is  that  it  immensely  '  marks,' 
as  they  say.  It  will  have  made  a  big  public  difference 
— from  this  day;  though  it's  of  course  aimed  not  so 
much  at  persons  as  at  conditions;  which  it  calls  upon 
us  all  somehow  to  tackle." 

"Exactly"  — she  was  full  of  the  saving  vision;  "but 
as  the  conditions  are  directly  embodied  in  persons " 

"  Oh,  of  course  it  here  and  there  bells  the  cat;  which 
means  that  it  bells  three  or  four." 

"Yes,"  she  richly  brooded — "Lady  Lappington  is 
a  cat!" 

"She  will  have  been  'belled,'  at  any  rate,  with  your 
father,"  Hugh  amusedly  went  on,  "to  the  certainty  of 
a  row;  and  a  row  can  only  be  good  for  us — I  mean  for 
us  in  particular."  Yet  he  had  to  bethink  himself. 
"The  case  depends  a  good  deal  of  course  on  how  your 
father  takes  such  a  resounding  rap." 

132 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Oh,  I  know  how  he'll  take  it!"— her  perception 
went  all  the  way. 

"In  the  very  highest  and  properest  spirit?" 

"Well,  you'll  see."  She  was  as  brave  as  she  was 
clear.  "  Or  at  least  /  shall ! " 

Struck  with  all  this  in  her  he  renewed  his  homage. 
"You  are,  yes,  splendid!" 

"I  even,"  she  laughed,  "surprise  myself." 

But  he  was  already  back  at  his  calculations.  "  How 
early  do  the  papers  get  to  you?" 

"At  Dedborough  ?  Oh,  quite  for  breakfast — which 
isn't,  however,  very  early." 

"Then  that's  what  has  caused  his  wire  to  Bender." 

"But  how  will  such  talk  strike  him?"  the  girl 
asked. 

Hugh  meanwhile,  visibly,  had  not  only  followed  his 
train  of  thought,  he  had  let  it  lead  him  to  certainty. 
"It  will  have  moved  Mr.  Bender  to  absolute  rap 
ture." 

"Rather,"  Lady  Grace  wondered,  "than  have  put 
him  off?" 

"It  will  have  put  him  prodigiously  on!  Mr.  Ben 
der — as  he  said  to  me  at  Dedborough  of  his  noble  host 
there,"  Hugh  pursued — "is  'a  very  nice  man';  but 
he's  a  product  of  the  world  of  advertisment,  and  ad 
vertisement  is  all  he  sees  and  aims  at.  He  lives  in  it 
as  a  saint  in  glory  or  a  fish  in  water." 


THE  OUTCRY 

She  took  it  from  him  as  half  doubting.  "  But  mayn't 
advertisement,  in  so  special  a  case,  turn,  on  the  whole, 
against  him?" 

Hugh  shook  a  negative  forefinger  with  an  expression 
he  might  have  caught  from  foreign  comrades.  "He 
rides  the  biggest  whirlwind — he  has  got  it  saddled  and 
bitted." 

She  faced  the  image,  but  cast  about.  "  Then  where 
does  our  success  come  in?" 

"In  our  making  the  beast,  all  the  same,  bolt  with  him 
and  throw  him."  And  Hugh  further  pointed  the  moral. 
"If  in  such  proceedings  all  he  knows  is  publicity  the 
thing  is  to  give  him  publicity,  and  it's  only  a  question 
of  giving  him  enough.  By  the  time  he  has  enough  for 
himself,  you  see,  he'll  have  too  much  for  every  one  else 
— so  that  we  shall  *'  up '  in  a  body  and  slay  him." 

The  girl's  eyebrows,  in  her  wondering  face,  rose  to  a 
question.  "  But  if  he  has  meanwhile  got  the  picture  ?  " 

"We'll  slay  him  before  he  gets  it!"  He  revelled  in 
the  breadth  of  his  view.  "  Our  own  policy  must  be  to 
organise  to  that  end  the  inevitable  outcry.  Organise 
Bender  himself — organise  him  to  scandal."  Hugh  had 
already  even  pity  to  spare  for  their  victim.  "  He  won't 
know  it  from  a  boom." 

Though  carried  along,  however,  Lady  Grace  could 
still  measure.  "  But  that  will  be  only  if  he  wants  and 
decides  for  the  picture." 


THE  OUTCRY 

"  We  must  make  him.  then  want  and  decide  for  it — 
decide,  that  is,  for  'ours.'  To  save  it  we  must  work 
him  up — he'll  in  that  case  want  it  so  indecently  much. 
Then  we  shall  have  to  want  it  more!" 

11  Well,"  she  anxiously  felt  it  her  duty  to  remind  him, 
"you  can  take  a  horse  to  water !" 

"Oh,  trust  me  to  make  him  drink!" 

There  appeared  a  note  in  this  that  convinced  her. 
"It's  you,  Mr.  Crimble,  who  are  'splendid'!"  \/ 

"Well,  I  shall  be— with  my  jolly  wire!"  And  all 
on  that  scent  again,  "May  I  come  back  to  you  from 
the  club  with  Pappendick's  news?"  he  asked. 

"Why,  rather,  of  course,  come  back!" 

"Only  not,"  he  debated,  "till  your  father  has  left." 

Lady  Grace  considered  too,  but  sharply  decided. 
"Come  when  you  have  it.  But  tell  me  first,"  she 
added,  "one  thing."  She  hung  fire  a  little  while  he 
waited,  but  she  brought  it  out.  "  Was  it  you  who  got 
the  'Journal'  to  speak?" 

"Ah,  one  scarcely  'gets'  the  'Journal'!" 

"Who  then  gave  them  their  'tip'?" 

"About  the  Mantovano  and  its  peril?"  Well,  he 
took  a  moment — but  only  not  to  say;  in  addition  to 
which  the  butler  had  reappeared,  entering  from  the 
lobby.  "I'll  tell  you,"  he  laughed,  "when  I  come 
back!" 

Gotch  had  his  manner  of  announcement  while  the 


THE  OUTCRY 

visitor  was  mounting  the  stairs.     "Mr.  Breckenridge 
Bender!" 

"  Ah  then  I  go,"  said  Lady  Grace  at  once. 

"I'll  stay  three  minutes."  Hugh  turned  with  her, 
alertly,  to  the  easier  issue,  signalling  hope  and  cheer 
from  that  threshold  as  he  watched  her  disappear;  after 
which  he  faced  about  with  as  brave  a  smile  and  as 
ready  for  immediate  action  as  if  she  had  there  within 
kissed  her  hand  to  him.  Mr.  Bender  emerged  at  the 
same  instant,  Gotch  withdrawing  and  closing  the  door 
behind  him;  and  the  former  personage,  recognising 
his  young  friend,  threw  up  his  hands  for  friendly 
pleasure. 


Ill 


"An,  Mr.  Crimble,"  he  cordially  inquired,  "you've 
come  with  your  great  news?" 

Hugh  caught  the  allusion,  it  would  have  seemed,  but 
after  a  moment.  "News  of  the  Moretto?  No,  Mr. 
Bender,  I  haven't  news  yet."  But  he  added  as  with 
high  candour  for  the  visitor's  motion  of  disappoint 
ment:  "  I  think  I  warned  you,  you  know,  that  it  would 
take  three  or  four  weeks." 

"Well,  in  my  country,"  Mr.  Bender  returned  with 
disgust,  "it  would  take  three  or  four  minutes!  Can't 
you  make  'em  step  more  lively?" 

136 ' 


THE  OUTCRY 

"I'm  expecting,  sir,"  said  Hugh  good-humouredly, 
"a  report  from  hour  to  hour." 

"Then  will  you  let  me  have  it  right  off?" 

Hugh  indulged  in  a  pause;  after  which  very  frankly: 
"Ah,  it's  scarcely  for  you,  Mr.  Bender,  that  I'm  act 
ing!" 

The  great  collector  was  but  briefly  checked.  "  Well, 
can't  you  just  act  for  Art?" 

"Oh,  you're  doing  that  yourself  so  powerfully," 
Hugh  laughed,  "that  I  think  I  had  best  leave  it  to 
you!" 

His  friend  looked  at  him  as  some  inspector  on  cir 
cuit  might  look  at  a  new  improvement.  "Don't  you 
want  to  go  round  acting  with  me?" 

"Go  'on  tour,'  as  it  were?  Oh,  frankly,  Mr.  Ben 
der,"  Hugh  said,  "if  I  had  any  weight !" 

"  You'd  add  it  to  your  end  of  the  beam  ?  Why,  what 
have  I  done  that  you  should  go  back  on  me — after 
working  me  up  so  down  there  ?  The  worst  I've  done," 
Mr.  Bender  continued,  "is  to  refuse  that  Moretto." 

"Has  it  deplorably  been  offered  you?"  our  young 
man  cried,  unmistakably  and  sincerely  affected.  After 
which  he  went  on,  as  his  fellow-visitor  only  eyed  him 
hard,  not,  on  second  thoughts,  giving  the  owner  of  the 
great  work  away:  "Then  why  are  you — as  if  you  were 
a  banished  Romeo — so  keen  for  news  from  Verona?" 
To  this  odd  mixture  of  business  and  literature  Mr. 


THE  OUTCRY 

Bender  made  no  reply,  contenting  himself  with  but  a 
large  vague  blandness  that  wore  in  him  somehow  the 
mark  of  tested  utility;  so  that  Hugh  put  him  another 
question:  "  Aren't  you  here,  sir,  on  the  chance  of  the 
Mantovano?" 

"I'm  here,"  he  then  imperturbably  said,  "because 
Lord  Theign  has  wired  me  to  meet  him.  Ain't  you 
here  for  that  yourself?" 

Hugh  betrayed  for  a  moment  his  enjoyment  of  a 
"big"  choice  of  answers.  "Dear,  no!  I've  but  been 
in,  by  Lady  Sandgate's  leave,  to  see  that  grand  Law 
rence." 

"Ah  yes,  she's  very  kind  about  it — one  does  go 
'in.' '  After  which  Mr.  Bender  had,  even  in  the  at 
mosphere  of  his  danger,  a  throb  of  curiosity.  "Is 
any  one  after  that  grand  Lawrence?" 

"  Oh,  I  hope  not,"  Hugh  laughed,  "  unless  you  again 
I ij dreadfully  are:  wonderful  thing  as  it  is  and  so  just 
in  its  right  place  there." 

"You  call  it,"  Mr.  Bender  impartially  inquired,  "a 
very  wonderful  thing?" 

"  Well,  as  a  Lawrence,  it  has  quite  bowled  me  over" 
— Hugh  spoke  as  for  the  strictly  aesthetic  awkward 
ness  of  that.  "But  you  know  I  take  my  pictures 
hard."  He  gave  a  punch  to  his  hat,  pressed  for  time 
in  this  connection  as  he  was  glad  truly  to  appear  to  his 
friend.  "I  must  make  my  little  rapport"  Yet  be- 

138 


THE  OUTCRY 

fore  it  he  did  seek  briefly  to  explain.  "  We're  a  band 
of  young  men  who  care — and  we  watch  the  great 
things.  Also — for  I  must  give  you  the  real  truth  about 
myself — we  watch  the  great  people." 

"  Well,  I  guess  I'm  used  to  being  watched — if  that's 
the  worst  you  can  do."  To  which  Mr.  Bender  added 
in  his  homely  way:  "But  you  know,  Mr.  Crimble, 
what  I'm  really  after." 

Hugh's  strategy  on  this  would  again  have  peeped 
out  for  us.  "The  man  in  this  morning's  'Journal'  ap 
pears  at  least  to  have  discovered." 

"Yes,  the  man  in  this  morning's  ' Journal'  has  dis 
covered  three  or  four  weeks — as  it  appears  to  take 
you  here  for  everything — after  my  beginning  to  talk. 
Why,  they  knew  I  was  talking  that  time  ago  on  the 
other  side." 

"  Oh,  they  know  things  in  the  States,"  Hugh  cheer 
fully  agreed,  "so  independently  of  their  happening! 
But  you  must  have  talked  loud." 

"Well,  I  haven't  so  much  talked  as  raved,"  Mr. 
Bender  conceded — "for  I'm  afraid  that  when  I  do 
want  a  thing  I  rave  till  I  get  it.  You  heard  me  at  Ded- 
borough,  and  your  enterprising  daily  press  has  at  last 
caught  the  echo." 

"Then  they'll  make  up  for  lost  time!  But  have 
you  done  it,"  Hugh  asked,  "to  prepare  an  alibi?" 

"An  alibi?" 


THE  OUTCRY 

"By  ' raving/  as  you  say,  the  saddle  on  the  wrong 
horse.  I  don't  think  you  at  all  believe  you'll  get  the 
Sir  Joshua — but  meanwhile  we  shall  have  cleared  up 
the  question  of  the  Moretto." 

Mr.  Bender,  imperturbable,  didn't  speak  till  he  had 
done  justice  to  this  picture  of  his  subtlety.  "Then, 
why  on  earth  do  you  want  to  boom  the  Moretto?" 

"You  ask  that,"  said  Hugh,  "because  it's  the 
boomed  thing  that's  most  in  peril." 

"Well,  it's  the  big,  the  bigger,  the  biggest  things, 
and  if  you  drag  their  value  to  the  light  why  shouldn't 
we  want  to  grab  them  and  carry  them  off — the  same 
as  all  of  you  originally  did?" 

"Ah,  not  quite  the  same,"  Hugh  smiled— "that  I 
will  say  for  you!" 

"  Yes,  you  stick  it  on  now — you  have  got  an  eye  for 
the  rise  in  values.  But  I  grant  you  your  unearned 
increment,  and  you  ought  to  be  mighty  glad  that,  to 
such  a  tune,  I'll  pay  it  you." 

Our  young  man  kept,  during  a  moment's  thought, 
his  eyes  on  his  companion,  and  then  resumed  with  all 
intensity  and  candour:  "You  may  easily,  Mr.  Ben 
der,  be  too  much  for  me — as  you  appear  too  much 
for  far  greater  people.  But  may  I  ask  you,  very  earn 
estly,  for  your  word  on  this,  as  to  any  case  in  which 
that  happens — that  when  precious  things,  things  we 
are  to  lose  here,  are  knocked  down  to  you,  you'll  let 

140 


THE  OUTCRY 

us  at  least  take  leave  of  them,  let  us  have  a  sight  of 
them  in  London,  before  they're  borne  off  ?" 

Mr.  Bender's  big  face  fell  almost  with  a  crash. 
"  Hand  them  over,  you  mean,  to  the  sandwich  men  on 
Bond  Street?" 

"  To  one  or  other  of  the  placard  and  poster  men — I 
don't  insist  on  the  inserted  human  slice!  Let  the 
great  values,  as  a  compensation  to  us,  be  on  view  for 
three  or  four  weeks." 

"You  ask  me,"  Mr.  Bender  returned,  "for  a  general 
assurance  to  that  effect?" 

"  Well,  a  particular  one — so  it  be  particular  enough," 
Hugh  said — "  will  do  just  for  now.  Let  me  put  in  my 
plea  for  the  issue — well,  of  the  value  that's  actually 
in  the  scales." 

"The  Mantovano-Moretto?" 

"The  Moretto-Mantovano!" 

Mr.  Bender  carnivorously  smiled.  "Hadn't  we 
better  know  which  it  is  first?" 

Hugh  had  a  motion  of  practical  indifference  for 
this.  "  The  public  interest — playing  so  straight  on  the 
question — may  help  to  settle  it.  By  which  I  mean  that 
it  will  profit  enormously — the  question  of  probability, 
of  identity  itself  will — by  the  discussion  it  will  create. 
The  discussion  will  promote  certainty " 

"And  certainty,"  Mr.  Bender  massively  mused, 
"will  kick  up  a  row." 

141 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Of  course  it  will  kick  up  a  row!"— Hugh  thoroughly 
guaranteed  that.  "You'll  be,  for  the  month,  the  best- 
abused  man  in  England — if  you  venture  to  remain  here 
at  all;  except,  naturally,  poor  Lord  Theign." 

"  Whom  it  won't  be  my  interest,  at  the  same  time,  to 
worry  into  backing  down." 

"But  whom  it  will  be  exceedingly  mine  to  practise 
on" — and  Hugh  laughed  as  at  the  fun  before  them— 
"if  I  may  entertain  the  sweet  hope  of  success.  The 
only  thing  is — from  my  point  of  view,"  he  went  on — 
"that  backing  down  before  what  he  will  call  vulgar 
clamour  isn't  in  the  least  in  his  traditions,  nothing  less 
so;  and  that  if  there  should  be  really  too  much  of  it 
for  his  taste  or  his  nerves  he'll  set  his  handsome  face 
as  a  stone  and  never  budge  an  inch.  But  at  least 
again  what  I  appeal  to  you  for  will  have  taken  place 
— the  picture  will  have  been  seen  by  a  lot  of  people 
who'll  care." 

"It  will  have  been  seen,"  Mr.  Bender  amended— 
"  on  the  mere  contingency  of  my  acquisition  of  it — only 
if  its  present  owner  consents." 

"  ' Consents '?"  Hugh  almost  derisively  echoed; 
"why,  he'll  propose  it  himself,  he'll  insist  on  it,  he'll 
put  it  through,  once  he's  angry  enough — as  angry,  I 
mean,  as  almost  any  public  criticism  of  a  personal 
act  of  his  will  be  sure  to  make  him;  and  I'm  afraid 
the  striking  criticism,  or  at  least  animadversion,  of 

142 


THE  OUTCRY 

this  morning,  will  have  blown  on  his  flame  of  bra 
vado." 

Inevitably  a  student  of  character,  Mr.  Bender  rose 
to  the  occasion.  "Yes,  I  guess  he's  pretty  mad." 

"They've  imputed  to  him" — Hugh  but  wanted  to 
abound  in  that  sense — "an  intention  of  which  after  all 
he  isn't  guilty." 

"So  that" — his  listener  glowed  with  interested  op 
timism — "if  they  don't  look  out,  if  they  impute  it  to 
him  again,  I  guess  he'll  just  go  and  be  guilty!" 

Hugh  might  at  this  moment  have  shown  to  an 
initiated  eye  as  fairly  elated  by  the  sense  of  producing 
something  of  the  effect  he  had  hoped.  "You  enter 
tain  the  fond  vision  of  lashing  them  up  to  that  mis 
take,  oh  fisher  in  troubled  waters?"  And  then  with 
a  finer  art,  as  his  companion,  expansively  bright  but 
crudely  acute,  eyed  him  in  turn  as  if  to  sound  him: 
"The  strongest  thing  in  such  a  type — one  does  make 
out — is  his  resentment  of  a  liberty  taken;  and  the  most 
natural  furthermore  is  quite  that  he  should  feel  almost 
anything  you  do  take  uninvited  from  the  groaning 
board  of  his  banquet  of  life  to  be  such  a  liberty." 

Mr.  Bender  participated  thus  at  his  perceptive  ease 
in  the  exposed  aristocratic  illusion.  "Yes,  I  guess  he 
has  always  lived  as  he  likes,  the  way  those  of  you 
who  have  got  things  fixed  for  them  do,  over  here;  and 
to  have  to  quit  it  on  account  of  unpleasant  remark — " 

143  •• 


THE  OUTCRY 

But  he  gave  up  thoughtfully  trying  to  express  what 
this  must  be;  reduced  to  the  mere  synthetic  inter 
jection  "My!" 

"That's  it,  Mr.  Bender,"  Hugh  said  for  the  conse 
cration  of  such  a  moral;  "he  won't  quit  it  without  a 
hard  struggle." 

Mr.  Bender  hereupon  at  last  gave  himself  quite 
gaily  away  as  to  his  high  calculation  of  impunity. 
"Well,  I  guess  he  won't  struggle  too  hard  for  me  to 
hold  on  to  him  if  I  want  to!" 

"  In  the  thick  of  the  conflict  then,  however  that  may 
be,"  Hugh  returned,  "don't  forget  what  I've  urged  on 
you — the  claim  of  our  desolate  country." 

But  his  friend  had  an  answer  to  this.  "  My  natural 
interest,  Mr.  Crimble — considering  what  I  do  for  it 
— is  in  the  claim  of  ours.  But  I  wish  you  were  on  my 
side!" 

"Not  so  much,"  Hugh  hungrily  and  truthfully 
laughed,  "as  I  wish  you  were  on  mine!"  Decidedly, 
none  the  less,  he  had  to  go.  "Good-bye — for  an 
other  look  here!" 

He  reached  the  doorway  of  the  second  room,  where, 
however,  his  companion,  freshly  alert  at  this,  stayed 
him  by  a  gesture.  "How  much  is  she  really  worth ?" 

"  'She'?"  Hugh,  staring  a  moment,  was  miles  at 
sea.  "Lady  Sandgate?" 

"Her  great-grandmother." 
144 


THE  OUTCRY 

A  responsible  answer  was  prevented — the  butler 
was  again  with  them;  he  had  opened  wide  the  other 
door  and  he  named  to  Mr.  Bender  the  personage 
under  his  convoy.  "Lord  John!" 

Hugh  caught  this  from  the  inner  threshold,  and  it 
gave  him  his  escape.  "Oh,  ask  that  friend!"  With 
which  he  sought  the  further  passage  to  the  staircase 
and  street,  while  Lord  John  arrived  in  charge  of  Mr. 
Gotch,  who,  having  remarked  to  the  two  occupants  of 
the  front  drawing-room  that  her  ladyship  would  come, 
left  them  together. 


IV 


"  THEN  Theign's  not  yet  here ! "  Lord  John  had  to 
resign  himself  as  he  greeted  his  American  ally.  "  But 
he  told  me  I  should  find  you." 

"He  has  kept  me  waiting,"  that  gentleman  returned 
— "but  what's  the  matter  with  him  anyway?" 

"The  matter  with  him" — Lord  John  treated  such 
ignorance  as  irritating — "  must  of  course  be  this  beast 
ly  thing  in  the  'Journal.'" 

Mr.  Bender  proclaimed,  on  the  other  hand,  his  in 
capacity  to  seize  such  connections.  "  What's  the  mat- 
r  ter  with  the  beastly  thing?" 

"  Why,  aren't  you  aware  that  the  stiffest  bit  of  it  is 
a  regular  dig  at  you?" 


THE  OUTCRY 

"If  you  call  that  a  regular  dig  you  can't  have  had 
much  experience  of  the  Papers.  I've  known  them  to 
dig  much  deeper." 

"  I've  had  no  experience  of  such  horrid  attacks,  thank 
goodness;  but  do  you  mean  to  say,"  asked  Lord  John 
with  the  surprise  of  his  own  delicacy,  "that  you  don't 
unpleasantly  feel  it?" 

"Feel  it  where,  my  dear  sir?" 

"Why,  God  bless  me,  such  impertinence,  every 
where!" 

"All  over  me  at  once?" — Mr.  Bender  took  refuge 
in  easy  humour.  "Well,  I'm  a  large  man — so  when 
I  want  to  feel  so  much  I  look  out  for  something  good. 
But  what,  if  he  suffers  from  the  blot  on  his  ermine — 
ain't  that  what  you  wear? — does  our  friend  propose 
to  do  about  it?" 

Lord  John  had  a  demur,  which  was  immediately 
followed  by  the  apprehension  of  support  in  his  un 
certainty.  Lady  Sandgate  was  before  them,  having 
reached  them  through  the  other  room,  and  to  her  he  at 
once  referred  the  question.  "What  will  Theign  pro 
pose,  do  you  think,  Lady  Sandgate,  to  do  about  it?" 

She  breathed  both  her  hospitality  and  her  vague 
ness.  "To  'do' ?" 

"  Don't  you  know  about  the  thing  in  the  'Journal' — 
awfully  offensive  all  round?" 

"There'd  be  even  a  little  pinch  for  you  in  it,"  Mr. 
146 


THE  OUTCRY 

Bender  said  to  her — "if  you  were  bent  on  fitting  the 
shoe!" 

Well,  she  met  it  all  as  gaily  as  was  compatible  with 
a  firm  look  at  her  elder  guest  while  she  took  her  place 
with  them.  "  Oh,  the  shoes  of  such  monsters  as  that  are 
much  too  big  for  poor  me!"  But  she  was  more  spe 
cific  for  Lord  John.  "I  know  only  what  Grace  has 
just  told  me;  but  since  it's  a  question  of  footgear  dear 
Theign  will  certainly — what  you  may  call — take  his 
stand!" 

Lord  John  welcomed  this  assurance.  "If  I  know 
him  he'll  take  it  splendidly!" 

Mr.  Bender's  attention  was  genial,  though  rather 
more  detached.  "And  what — while  he's  about  it — 
will  he  take  it  particularly  on?" 

"Oh,  we've  plenty  of  things,  thank  heaven,"  said 
Lady  Sandgate,  "for  a  man  in  Theign's  position  to 
hold  fast  by!" 

Lord  John  freely  confirmed  it.  "  Scores  and  scores 
— rather!  And  I  will  say  for  us  that,  with  the  rotten 
way  things  seem  going,  the  fact  may  soon  become  a 
real  convenience." 

Mr.  Bender  seemed  struck — and  not  unsympathetic. 
"I  see  that  your  system  would  be  rather  a  fraud  if  you 
hadn't  pretty  well  fixed  that  I" 

Lady  Sandgate  spoke  as  one  at  present  none  the 
less  substantially  warned  and  convinced.  "  It  doesn't, 


THE  OUTCRY 

however,  alter  the  fact  that  we've  thus  in  our  ears  the 
first  growl  of  an  outcry." 

"Ah,"  Lord  John  concurred,  "we've  unmistakably 
the  first  growl  of  an  outcry!" 

Mr.  Bender's  judgment  on  the  matter  paused  at 
sight  of  Lord  Theign,  introduced  and  announced,  as 
Lord  John  spoke,  by  Gotch;  but  with  the  result  of 
his  addressing  directly  the  person  so  presenting  him 
self.  "  Why,  they  tell  me  that  what  this  means,  Lord 
Theign,  is  the  first  growl  of  an  outcry!" 

The  appearance  of  the  most  eminent  figure  in  the 
group  might  have  been  held  in  itself  to  testify  to  some 
such  truth ;  in  the  sense  at  least  that  a  certain  conscious 
radiance,  a  gathered  light  of  battle  in  his  lordship's  as 
pect  would  have  been  explained  by  his  having  taken 
the  full  measure — an  inner  success  with  which  he 
glowed — of  some  high  provocation.  He  was  flushed, 
but  he  bore  it  as  the  ensign  of  his  house;  he  was  so 
admirably,  vividly  dressed,  for  the  morning  hour  and 
for  his  journey,  that  he  shone  as  with  the  armour  of  a 
knight;  and  the  whole  effect  of  him,  from  head  to  foot, 
with  every  jerk  of  his  unconcern  and  every  flash  of  his 
ease,  was  to  call  attention  to  his  being  utterly  unshaken 
and  knowing  perfectly  what  he  was  about.  It  was  at 
this  happy  pitch  that  he  replied  to  the  prime  upsetter 
of  his  peace. 

"I'm  afraid  I  don't  know  what  anything  means  to 
148 


THE  OUTCRY 

you,  Mr.  Bender — but  it's  exactly  to  find  out  that  I've 
asked  you,  with  our  friend  John,  kindly  to  meet  me 
here.  For  a  very  brief  conference,  dear  lady,  by  your 
good  leave,"  he  went  on  to  Lady  Sandgate;  "at  which 
I'm  only  too  pleased  that  you  yourself  should  assist. 
The  '  first  growl '  of  any  outcry,  I  may  mention  to  you 
all,  affects  me  no  more  than  the  last  will !" 

"So  I'm  delighted  to  gather" — Lady  Sandgate  took 
him  straight  up — "  that  you  don't  let  go  your  inestim 
able  Cure." 

He  at  first  quite  stared  superior — "'Let  go'?" — 
but  then  treated  it  with  a  lighter  touch.  "Upon  my 
honour  I  might,  you  know — that  dose  of  the  daily 
press  has  made  me  feel  so  fit!  I  arrive  at  any  rate," 
he  pursued  to  the  others  and  in  particular  to  Mr.  Ben 
der,  "I  arrive  with  my  decision  taken — which  I've 
thought  may  perhaps  interest  you.  If  that  tuppeny 
rot  is  an  attempt  at  an  outcry  I  simply  nip  it  in  the 
bud." 

Lord  John  rejoicingly  approved.  "Absolutely  the 
only  way — with  the  least  self-respect — to  treat  it!" 

Lady  Sandgate,  on  the  other  hand,  sounded  a  scep 
tical  note.  "  But  are  you  sure  it's  so  easy,  Theign,  to 
hush  up  a  real  noise  ?" 

"It  ain't  what  I'd  call  a  real  one,  Lady  Sandgate," 
Mr.  Bender  said;  "you  can  generally  distinguish  a  real 
one  from  the  squeak  of  two  or  three  mice!  But  granted 
149 


THE  OUTCRY 

mice  do  affect  you,  Lord  Theign,  it  will  interest  me  to 
hear  what  sort  of  a  trap — by  what  you  say — you  pro 
pose  to  set  for  them." 

"You  must  allow  me  to  measure,  myself,  Mr.  Ben 
der,"  his  lordship  replied,  "the  importance  of  a  gross 
freedom  publicly  used  with  my  absolutely  personal 
proceedings  and  affairs;  to  the  cause  and  origin  of 
any  definite  report  of  which — in  such  circles! — I'm 
afraid  I  rather  wonder  if  you  yourself  can't  give  me  a 
clue." 

It  took  Mr.  Bender  a  minute  to  do  justice  to  these 
stately  remarks.  "You  rather  wonder  if  I've  talked 
of  how  I  feel  about  your  detaining  in  your  hands  my 
Beautiful  Duchess ?" 

"Oh,  if  you've  already  published  her  as  c yours '- 
with  your  power  of  publication!"  Lord  Theign  coldly 
laughed, — "of  course  I  trace  the  connection!" 

Mr.  Bender's  acceptance  of  responsibility  clearly 
cost  him  no  shade  of  a  pang.  "Why,  I  haven't  for 
quite  a  while  talked  of  a  blessed  other  thing — and  I'm 
capable  of  growing  more  profane  over  my  not  getting 
her  than  I  guess  any  one  would  dare  to  be  if  I  did." 

"Well,  you'll  certainly  not  'get'  her,  Mr.  Bender," 
Lady  Sandgate,  as  for  reasons  of  her  own,  bravely 
trumpeted;  "and  even  if  there  were  a  chance  of  it  don't 
you  see  that  your  way  wouldn't  be  publicly  to  abuse 
our  noble  friend?" 

150 


THE  OUTCRY 

Mr.  Bender  but  beamed,  in  reply,  upon  that  per 
sonage.  "  Oh,  I  guess  our  noble  friend  knows  I  have  to 
talk  big  about  big  things.  You  understand,  sir,  the 
scream  of  the  eagle!" 

"I'll  forgive  you,"  Lord  Theign  civilly  returned,  "all 
the  big  talk  you  like  if  you'll  now  understand  me.  My 
retort  to  that  hireling  pack  shall  be  at  once  to  dispose 
of  a  picture." 

Mr.  Bender  rather  failed  to  follow.  "But  that's 
what  you  wanted  to  do  before." 

"Pardon  me,"  said  his  lordship — "I  make  a  differ 
ence.  It's  what  you  wanted  me  to  do." 

The  mystification,  however,  continued.  "And  you 
were  not — as  you  seemed  then — willing?" 

Lord  Theign  waived  cross-questions.  "Well,  I'm 
willing  now — that's  all  that  need  concern  us.  Only, 
once  more  and  for  the  last  time,"  he  added  with  all 
authority,  "you  can't  have  our  Duchess!" 

"You  can't  have  our  Duchess!" — and  Lord  John, 
as  before  the  altar  of  patriotism,  wrapped  it  in  sacrifi 
cial  sighs. 

"You  can't  have  our  Duchess!"  Lady  Sandgate  re 
peated,  but  with  a  grace  that  took  the  sting  from 
her  triumph.  And  she  seemed  still  all  sweet  socia 
bility  as  she  added:  "I  wish  he'd  tell  you  too,  you 
dreadful  rich  thing,  that  you  can't  have  anything 
at  all!" 


THE  OUTCRY 

Lord  Theign,  however,  in  the  interest  of  harmony, 
deprecated  that  rigour.  "Ah,  what  then  would  be 
come  of  my  happy  retort?" 

"And  what — as  it  is"  Mr.  Bender  asked — "becomes 
of  my  unhappy  grievance?" 

"  Wouldn't  a  really  great  capture  make  up  to  you  for 
that?" 

"Well,  I  take  more  interest  in  what  I  want  than  in 
what  I  have — and  it  depends,  don't  you  see,  on  how 
you  measure  the  size." 

Lord  John  had  at  once  in  this  connection  a  bright 
idea.  "  Shouldn't  you  like  to  go  back  there  and  take 
the  measure  yourself?" 

Mr.  Bender  considered  him  as  through  narrowed 
eyelids.  "Look  again  at  that  tottering  Moretto?" 

"  Well,  its  size — as  you  say — isn't  in  any  light  a  neg 
ligible  quantity." 

You  mean  that — big  as  it  is — it  hasn't  yet  stopped 
growing?" 

The  question,  however,  as  he  immediately  showed, 
resided  in  what  Lord  Theign  himself  meant.  "It's 
more  to  the  purpose,"  he  said  to  Mr.  Bender,  "that  I 
should  mention  to  you  the  leading  feature,  or  in  other 
words  the  very  essence,  of  my  plan  of  campaign — 
which  is  to  put  the  picture  at  once  on  view."  He 
marked  his  idea  with  a  broad  but  elegant  gesture. 
"  On  view  as  a  thing  definitely  disposed  of." 

152 


THE  OUTCRY 

"I  say,  I  say,  I  say!"  cried  Lord  John,  moved  by 
this  bold  stroke  to  high  admiration. 

Lady  Sandgate's  approval  was  more  qualified. 
"  But  on  view,  dear  Theign,  how  ?" 

"With  one  of  those  pushing  people  in  Bond  Street." 
And  then  as  for  the  crushing  climax  of  his  policy:  "  As 
a  Mantovano  pure  and  simple." 

"But  my  dear  man,"  she  quavered,  "if  it  isn't 
one?" 

Mr.  Bender  at  once  anticipated;  the  wind  had  sud 
denly  risen  for  him  and  he  let  out  sail.  "Lady  Sand- 
gate,  it's  going,  by  all  that's — well,  interesting,  to 
be  one!" 

Lord  Theign  took  him  up  with  pleasure.  "You 
seize  me  ?  We  treat  it  as  one ! " 

Lord  John  eagerly  borrowed  the  emphasis.  "We 
treat  it  as  one!" 

Mr.  Bender  meanwhile  fed  with  an  opened  appe 
tite  on  the  thought — he  even  gave  it  back  larger.  "  As 
the  long-lost  Number  Eight!" 

Lord  Theign  happily  seized  him.  "That  will  be 
it — to  a  charm!" 

"It  will  make  them,"  Mr.  Bender  asked,  "madder 
than  anything?" 

His  patron — if  not  his  client — put  it  more  nobly. 
•  "It  will  markedly  affirm  my  attitude." 

"Which  will  in  turn  the  more  markedly  create  dis- 


THE  OUTCRY 

"It  may  create  all  it  will!" 

"Well,  if  you  don't  mind  it,  7  don't!"  Mr.  Bender 
concluded.  But  though  bathed  in  this  high  serenity 
he  was  all  for  the  rapid  application  of  it  elsewhere. 
"You'll  put  the  thing  on  view  right  off?" 

"  As  soon  as  the  proper  arrangement " 

"  You  put  off  your  journey  to  make  it  ?  "  Lady  Sand- 
gate  at  once  broke  in. 

Lord  Theign  bethought  himself — with  the  effect  of 
a  gracious  confidence  in  the  others.  "Not  if  these 
friends  will  act." 

"Oh,  I  guess  we'll  actl"   Mr.  Bender  declared. 

"Ah,  won't  we  though!"  Lord  John  re-echoed. 

"You  understand  then  I  have  an  interest?"  Mr. 
Bender  went  on  to  Lord  Theign. 

His  lordship's  irony  met  it.  "I  accept  that  compli 
cation — which  so  much  simplifies!" 

"And  yet  also  have  a  liberty?" 

"Where  else  would  be  those  you've  taken?  The 
point  is,"  said  Lord  Theign,  "that  /  have  a  show." 

It  settled  Mr.  Bender.  "Then  Til  fix  your  show." 
He  snatched  up  his  hat.  "Lord  John,  come  right 
round!" 

Lord  John  had  of  himself  reached  the  door,  which  he 
opened  to  let  the  whirlwind  tremendously  figured  by 
his  friend  pass  out  first.  Taking  leave  of  the  others 
he  gave  it  even  his  applause.  "The  fellow  can  do 
anything  anywhere!"  And  he  hastily  followed, 

154 


THE  OUTCRY 


LADY  SANDGATE,  left  alone  with  Lord  Theign,  drew 
the  line  at  their  companion's  enthusiasm.  "  That  may 
be  true  of  Mr.  Bender — for  it's  dreadful  how  he  bears 
one  down.  But  I  simply  find  him  a  terror." 

"Well,"  said  her  friend,  who  seemed  disposed  not 
to  fatigue  the  question,  "I  dare  say  a  terror  will  help 
me."  He  had  other  business  to  which  he  at  once  gave 
himself.  "And  now,  if  you  please,  for  that  girl." 

"I'll  send  her  to  you,"  she  replied,  "if  you  can't  stay 
to  luncheon." 

"I've  three  or  four  things  to  do,"  he  pleaded,  "and 
I  lunch  with  Kitty  at  one." 

She  submitted  in  that  case — but  disappointedly. 
"  With  Berkeley  Square  then  you've  time.  But  I  con 
fess  I  don't  quite  grasp  the  so  odd  inspiration  that 
you've  set  those  men  to  carry  out." 

He  showed  surprise  and  regret,  but  even  greater  de 
cision.  "Then  it  needn't  trouble  you,  dear — it's 
enough  that  I  myself  go  straight." 

"Are  you  so  very  convinced  it's  straight?" — she 
wouldn't  be  a  bore  to  him,  but  she  couldn't  not  be  a 
blessing. 

"What  in  the  world  else  is  it,"  he  asked,  "when, 
having  good  reasons,  one  acts  on  'em?" 

'55 


THE  OUTCRY 

"You  must  have  an  immense  array,"  she  sighed, 
"to  fly  so  in  the  face  of  Opinion!" 

"'Opinion'?"  he  commented — "I  fly  in  its  face? 
/  ! /Why,  the  vulgar  thing,  as  I'm  taking  my  quiet  walk, 
flies  in  mine  !  I  give  it  a  whack  with  my  umbrella  and 
send  it  about  its  business."  To  which  he  added  with 
more  reproach:  "It's  enough  to  have  been  dished  by 
Grace — without  your  falling  away!" 

Sadly  and  sweetly  she  defended  herself.  "It's  only 
my  great  affection — and  all  that  these  years  have  been 
for  us:  they  it  is  that  make  me  wish  you  weren't  so 
proud." 

"  I've  a  perfect  sense,  my  dear,  of  what  these  years 
have  been  for  us — a  very  charming  matter.  But 
'  proud '  is  it  you  find  me  of  the  daughter  who  does 
her  best  to  ruin  me,  or  of  the  one  who  does  her  best  to 
humiliate?" 

Lady  Sandgate,  not  undiscernibly,  took  her  choice 
of  ignoring  the  point  of  this.  "Your  surrenders  to 
Kitty  are  your  own  affair — but  are  you  sure  you  can 
really  bear  to  see  Grace?" 

"I  seem  expected  indeed  to  bear  much,"  he  said 
with  more  and  more  of  his  parental  bitterness,  "but 
I  don't  know  that  I'm  yet  in  a  funk  before  my  child. 
Doesn't  she  want  to  see  me,  with  any  contrition,  after 
the  trick  she  has  played  me?"  And  then  as  his  com 
panion's  answer  failed:  "In  spite  of  which  trick  you 


THE  OUTCRY 

suggest  that  I  should  leave  the  country  with  no  sign  of 
her  explaining ?" 

His  hostess  raised  her  head.  "  She  does  want  to  see 
you,  I  know;  but  you  must  recall  the  sequel  to  that  bad 
hour  at  Dedborough — when  it  was  you  who  declined 
to  see  her" 

"  Before  she  left  the  house  with  you,  the  next  day, 
for  this?" — he  was  entirely  reminiscent.  "What  I 
recall  is  that  even  if  I  had  condoned — that  evening — 
her  deception  of  we,  in  my  folly,  I  still  loathed,  for  my 
friend's  sake,  her  practical  joke  on  poor  John." 

Lady  Sandgate  indulged  in  the  shrug  conciliatory. 
"  It  was  your  very  complaint  that  your  own  appeal  to 
her  became  an  appeal  from  herself." 

"Yes,"  he  returned,  so  well  he  remembered,  "she 
was  about  as  civil  to  me  then — picking  a  quarrel  with 
me  on  such  a  trumped-up  ground! — as  that  devil  of 
a  fellow  in  the  newspaper;  the  taste  of  whose  elegant 
remarks,  for  that  matter,  she  must  now  altogether  en- 
joy!" 

His  good  friend  showily  balanced  and  might  have 
been  about  to  reply  with  weight;  but  what  she  in  fact 
brought  out  was  only:  "I  see  you're  right  about  it:  I 
must  let  her  speak  for  herself." 

"That  I  shall  greatly  prefer  to  her  speaking — as 
she  did  so  extraordinarily,  out  of  the  blue,  at  Dedbor 
ough,  upon  my  honour — for  the  wonderful  friends  she 


THE  OUTCRY 

picks  up:  the  picture-man  introduced  by  her  (what 
was  his  name?)  who  regularly  'cheeked'  me,  as  I  sup 
pose  he'd  call  it,  in  my  own  house,  and  whom  I  hope, 
by  the  way,  that  under  this  roof  she's  not  able  to  be 
quite  so  thick  with!" 

If  Lady  Sandgate  winced  at  that  vain  dream  she 
managed  not  to  betray  it,  and  she  had,  in  any  embar 
rassment  on  this  matter,  the  support,  as  we  know,  of 
her  own  tried  policy.  "She  leads  her  life  under  this 
roof  very  much  as  under  yours;  and  she's  not  of  an 
age,  remember,  for  me  to  pretend  either  to  watch  her 
movements  or  to  control  her  contacts."  Leaving  him 
however  thus  to  perform  his  pleasure  the  charming 
woman  had  before  she  went  an  abrupt  change  of  tone. 
"Whatever  your  relations  with  others,  dear  friend, 
don't  forget  that  Pm  still  here." 

Lord  Theign  accepted  the  reminder,  though,  the 
circumstances  being  such,  it  scarce  moved  him  to  ec 
stasy.  "That  you're  here,  thank  heaven,  is  of  course 
a  comfort — or  would  be  if  you  understood." 

"Ah,"  she  submissively  sighed,  "if  I  don't  always 
'understand'  a  spirit  so  much  higher  than  mine  and  a 
situation  so  much  more  complicated,  certainly,  I  at 
least  always  defer,  I  at  least  always — well,  what  can 
I  say  but  worship?"  And  then  as  he  remained  not 
other  than  finely  passive,  "The  old  altar,  Theign." 
she  went  on — "and  a  spark  of  the  old  fire!" 

158 


THE  OUTCRY 

He  had  not  looked  at  her  on  this — it  was  as  if  he 
shrank,  with  his  preoccupations,  from  a  tender  passage; 
but  he  let  her  take  his  left  hand.  "  So  I  feel! "  he  was, 
however,  kind  enough  to  answer. 

"Do  feel!"  she  returned  with  much  concentration. 
She  raised  the  hand  to  her  pressed  lips,  dropped  it 
and  with  a  rich  "Good-bye!"  reached  the  threshold 
of  the  other  room. 

"May  I  smoke?"  he  asked  before  she  had  disap 
peared. 

"Dear,  yes!" 

He  had  meanwhile  taken  out  his  cigarette  case  and 
was  looking  about  for  a  match.  But  something  else 
occurred  to  him.  "You  must  come  to  Victoria." 

"Rather!"  she  said  with  intensity;  and  with  that 
she  passed  away. 

VI 

LEFT  alone  he  had  a  moment's  meditation  where  he 
stood;  it  found  issue  in  an  articulate  "Poor  dear 
thing!" — an  exclamation  marked  at  once  with  pa 
tience  and  impatience,  with  resignation  and  ridicule. 
After  which,  waiting  for  his  daughter,  Lord  Theign 
slowly  and  absently  roamed,  finding  matches  at  last 
and  lighting  his  cigarette — all  with  an  air  of  concern 
that  had  settled  on  him  more  heavily  from  the  moment 
of  his  finding  himself  alone.  His  luxury  of  gloom — 


THE  OUTCRY 

if  gloom  it  was — dropped,  however,  on  his  taking  heed 
of  Lady  Grace,  who,  arriving  on  the  scene  through  the 
other  room,  had  had  just  time  to  stand  and  watch  him 
in  silence. 

"  Oh!"  he  jerked  out  at  sight  of  her — which  she  had 
to  content  herself  with  as  a  parental  greeting  after 
separation,  his  next  words  doing  little  to  qualify  its 
dryness.  "I  take  it  for  granted  that  you  know  I'm 
within  a  couple  of  hours  of  leaving  England  under  a 
necessity  of  health."  And  then  as  drawing  nearer, 
she  signified  without  speaking  her  possession  of  this 
fact:  "I've  thought  accordingly  that  before  I  go  I 
should — on  this  first  possible  occasion  since  that  odi 
ous  occurrence  at  Dedborough — like  to  leave  you  a 
little  more  food  for  meditation,  in  my  absence,  on  the 
painfully  false  position  in  which  you  there  placed  me." 
He  carried  himself  restlessly  even  perhaps  with  a 
shade  of  awkwardness,  to  which  her  stillness  was  a  con 
trast;  she  just  waited,  wholly  passive — possibly  indeed 
a  trifle  portentous.  "  If  you  had  plotted  and  planned 
it  in  advance,"  he  none  the  less  firmly  pursued,  "if 
you  had  acted  from  some  uncanny  or  malignant  mo 
tive,  you  couldn't  have  arranged  more  perfectly  to  in 
commode,  to  disconcert  and,  to  all  intents  and  pur 
poses,  make  light  of  me  and  insult  me."  Even  before 
this  charge  she  made  no  sign;  with  her  eyes  now  at 
tached  to  the  ground  she  let  him  proceed.  "I  had 

1 60 


THE  OUTCRY 

practically  guaranteed  to  our  excellent,  our  charming 
friend,  your  favourable  view  of  his  appeal — which  you 
yourself  too,  remember,  had  left  him  in  so  little  doubt 
of! — so  that,  having  by  your  performance  so  egre- 
giously  failed  him,  I  have  the  pleasure  of  their  com 
ing  down  on  me  for  explanations,  for  compensations, 
and  for  God  knows  what  besides." 

Lady  Grace,  looking  up  at  last,  left  him  in  no  doubt 
of  the  rigour  of  her  attention.  "Fm  sorry  indeed, 
father,  to  have  done  you  any  wrong;  but  may  I  ask 
whom,  in  such  a  connection,  you  refer  to  as  'they'?" 

"  'They'  ?"  he  echoed  in  the  manner  of  a  man  who 
has  had  handed  back  to  his  more  careful  eye,  across 
the  counter,  some  questionable  coin  that  he  has  tried 
to  pass.  "  Why,  your  own  sister  to  begin  with — whose 
interest  in  what  may  make  for  your  happiness  I  sup 
pose  you  decently  recognise;  and  his  people,  one  and 
all,  the  delightful  old  Duchess  in  particular,  who  only 
wanted  to  be  charming  to  you,  and  who  are  as  good 
people,  and  as  pleasant  and  as  clever,  damn  it,  when 
all's  said  and  done,  as  any  others  that  are  likely  to 
come  your  way."  It  clearly  did  his  lordship  good 
to  work  out  thus  his  case,  which  grew  more  and  more 
coherent  to  him  and  glowed  with  irresistible  colour. 
"Letting  alone  gallant  John  himself,  most  amiable 
of  men,  about  whose  merits  and  whose  claims  you  ap 
pear  to  have  pretended  to  agree  with  me  just  that  you 
161 


THE  OUTCRY 

might,  when  he  presumed,  poor  chap,  ardently  to  urge 
them,  deal  him  with  the  more  cruel  effect  that  calcu 
lated  blow  on  the  mouth!" 

It  was  clear  that  in  the  girl's  great  gravity  embar 
rassment  had  no  share.  "They  so  come  down  on  you 
I  understand  then,  father,  that  you're  obliged  to  come 
down  on  me?" 

"Assuredly — for  some  better  satisfaction  than  your 
just  moping  here  without  a  sign!" 

"But  a  sign  of  what,  father?"  she  asked — as  help 
less  as  a  lone  islander  scanning  the  horizon  for  a  sail. 

"  Of  your  appreciating,  of  your  in  some  degree  duti 
fully  considering,  the  predicament  into  which  you've 
put  me!" 

"Hasn't  it  occurred  to  you  in  the  least  that  you've 
rather  put  me  into  one?" 

He  threw  back  his  head  as  from  exasperated  nerves. 
"I  put  you  certainly  in  th'e  predicament  of  your  receiv 
ing  by  my  care  a  handsome  settlement  in  life — which 
all  the  elements  that  would  make  for  your  enjoying 
it  had  every  appearance  of  successfully  commending 
to  you."  The  perfect  readiness  of  which  on  his  lips 
had,  like  a  higher  wave,  the  virtue  of  lifting  and  drop 
ping  him  to  still  more  tangible  ground.  "And  if  I 
understand  you  aright  as  wishing  to  know  whether  I 
apologise  for  that  zeal,  why  you  take  a  most  preposter 
ous  view  of  our  relation  as  father  and  daughter." 

162 


THE  OUTCRY 

"  You  understand  me  no  better  than  I  fear  I  under 
stand  you,"  Lady  Grace  returned,  "  if  what  you  expect 
of  me  is  really  to  take  back  my  words  to  Lord  John." 
And  then  as  he  didn't  answer,  while  their  breach  gaped 
like  a  jostled  wound,  "  Have  you  seriously  come  to  pro 
pose — and  from  him  again,"  she  added — "that  I  shall 
reconsider  my  resolute  act  and  lend  myself  to  your 
beautiful  arrangement?" 

It  had  so  the  sound  of  unmixed  ridicule  that  he  could 
only,  for  his  dignity,  not  give  way  to  passion.  "I've 
come,  above  all,  for  Ms,  I  may  say,  Grace:  to  remind 
you  of  whom  you're  addressing  when  you  jibe  at  me, 
and  to  make  of  you  assuredly  a  plain  demand — 
exactly  as  to  whether  you  judged  us  to  have  actively 
incurred  your  treatment  of  our  unhappy  friend,  to 
have  brought  it  upon  us,  he  and  I,  by  my  refusal  to 
discuss  with  you  at  such  a  crisis  the  question  of  my 
disposition  of  a  particular  item  of  my  property.  I've 
only  to  look  at  you,  for  that  matter,"  Lord  Theign  con 
tinued — always  with  a  finer  point  and  a  higher  con 
sistency  as  his  rehearsal  of  his  wrongs  broadened — 
"to  have  my  inquiry,  as  it  seems  to  me,  eloquently 
answered.  You  flounced  away  from  poor  John,  you 
took,  as  he  tells  me,  'his  head  off,'  just  to  repay  me  for 
what  you  chose  to  regard  as  my  snub  on  the  score  of 
your  challenging  my  entertainment  of  a  possible  pur 
chaser;  a  rebuke  launched  at  me,  practically,  in  the 

163 


THE  OUTCRY 

presence  of  a  most  inferior  person,  a  stranger  and  an 
intruder,  from  whom  you  had  all  the  air  of  taking  your 
cue  for  naming  me  the  great  condition  on  which  you'd 
gratify  my  hope.  Am  I  to  understand,  in  other  words," 
— and  his  lordship  mounted  to  a  climax — "that  you 
sent  us  about  our  business  because  I  failed  to  gratify 
your  hope:  that  of  my  knocking  under  to  your  sudden 
monstrous  pretension  to  lay  down  the  law  for  my  choice 
of  ways  and  means  of  raising,  to  my  best  convenience, 
a  considerable  sum  of  money?  You'll  be  so  good  as 
to  understand,  once  for  all,  that  I  recognise  there  no 
right  of  interference  from  any  quarter — and  also  to 
let  that  knowledge  govern  your  behaviour  in  my  ab 
sence." 

Lady  Grace  had  thus  for  some  minutes  waited  on 
his  words — waited  even  as  almost  with  anxiety  for  the 
safe  conduct  he  might  look  to  from  some  of  the  more 
extravagant  of  them.  But  he  at  least  felt  at  the  end — 
if  it  was  an  end — all  he  owed  them;  so  that  there  was 
nothing  for  her  but  to  accept  as  achieved  his  dreadful 
felicity.  "  You're  very  angry  with  me,  and  I  hope  you 
won't  feel  me  simply  '  aggravating '  if  I  say  that,  think 
ing  everything  over,  I've  done  my  best  to  allow  for 
that.  But  I  can  answer  your  question  if  I  do  answer 
it  by  saying  that  my  discovery  of  your  possible  sacri 
fice  of  one  of  our  most  beautiful  things  didn't  predis 
pose  me  to  decide  in  favour  of  a  person — however 

164 


THE  OUTCRY 

1  backed '  by  you — for  whose  benefit  the  sacrifice  was 
to  take  place.  Frankly,"  the  girl  pushed  on,  "I  did 
quite  hate,  for  the  moment,  everything  that  might  make 
for  such  a  mistake;  and  took  the  darkest  view,  let  me 
also  confess,  of  every  one,  without  exception,  connected 
with  it.  I  interceded  with  you,  earnestly,  for  our  pre 
cious  picture,  and  you  wouldn't  on  any  terms  have  my 
intercession.  On  top  of  that  Lord  John  blundered 
V'm,  without  timeliness  or  tact — and  I'm  afraid  that,  as 
I  hadn't  been  the  least  in  love  with  him  even  before, 
he  did  have  to  take  the  consequence." 

Lord  Theign,  with  an  elated  swing  of  his  person, 
greeted  this  as  all  he  could  possibly  want.  "  You  rec 
ognise  then  that  your  reception  of  him  was  purely 
vindictive! — the  meaning  of  which  is  that  unless  my 
conduct  of  my  private  interests,  of  which  you  know 
nothing  whatever,  happens  to  square  with  your  su 
perior  wisdom  you'll  put  me  under  boycott  all  round! 
While  you  chatter  about  mistakes  and  blunders,  and 
about  our  charming  friend's  lack  of  the  discretion  of 
which  you  yourself  set  so  grand  an  example,  what  ac 
count  have  you  to  offer  of  the  scene  you  made  me 
there  before  that  fellow— your  confederate,  as  he  had 
all  the  air  of  being! — by  giving  it  me  with  such  ef 
frontery  that,  if  I  had  eminently  done  with  him  after 
his  remarkable  display,  you  at  least  were  but  the  more 
determined  to  see  him  keep  it  up  ? " 

165 


THE  OUTCRY 

The  girl's  justification,  clearly,  was  very  present  to 
her,  and  not  less  obviously  the  truth  that  to  make  it 
strong  she  must,  avoiding  every  side-issue,  keep  it 
very  simple.  "The  only  account  I  can  give  you,  I 
think,  is  that  I  could  but  speak  at  such  a  moment  as  I 
felt,  and  that  I  felt — well,  how  can  I  say  how  deeply  ? 
If  you  can  really  bear  to  know,  I  feel  so  still  I  care  in 
fact  more  than  ever  that  we  shouldn't  do  such  things. 
I  care,  if  you  like,  to  indiscretion — I  care,  if  you  like, 
to  offence,  to  arrogance,  to  folly.  But  even  as  my  last 
word  to  you  before  you  leave  England  on  the  conclusion 
of  such  a  step,  I'm  ready  to  cry  out  to  you  that  you 
oughtn't,  you  oughtn't,  you  oughtn't!" 

Her  father,  with  wonder-moved,  elevated  brows  and 
high  commanding  hand,  checked  her  as  in  an  act  really 
of  violence — save  that,  like  an  inflamed  young  priestess, 
she  had  already,  in  essence,  delivered  her  message. 
"Hallo,  hallo,  hallo,  my  distracted  daughter — no  ' cry 
ing  out,'  if  you  please!"  After  which,  while  arrested 
but  unabashed,  she  still  kept  her  lighted  eyes  on  him, 
he  gave  back  her  conscious  stare  for  a  minute,  inwardly 
and  rapidly  turning  things  over,  making  connections, 
taking,  as  after  some  long  and  lamentable  lapse  of  ob 
servation,  a  new  strange  measure  of  her:  all  to  the 
upshot  of  his  then  speaking  with  a  difference  of  tone, 
a  recognition  of  still  more  of  the  odious  than  he  had 
supposed,  so  that  the  case  might  really  call  for  some 

166 


\) 


THE  OUTCRY 

coolness.  "You  keep  bad  company,  Grace — it  pays 
the  devil  with  your  sense  of  proportion.  If  you  make 
this  row  when  I  sell  a  picture,  what  will  be  left  to  you 
when  I  forge  a  cheque?" 

"If  you  had  arrived  at  the  necessity  of  forging  a 
cheque,"  she  answered,  "I  should  then  resign  myself 
to  that  of  your  selling  a  picture." 

"But  not  short  of  that!" 

"Not  short  of  that.     Not  one  of  ours." 

"  But  I  couldn't,"  said  his  lordship  with  his  best  and 
coldest  amusement,  "sell  one  of  somebody  else's!" 

She  was,  however,  not  disconcerted.  "  Other  people 
do  other  things — they  appear  to  have  done  them,  and 
to  be  doing  them,  all  about  us.  But  we  have  been  so 
decently  different — always  and  ever.  We've  never 
done  anything  disloyal." 

"  ' Disloyal'?" — he  was  more  largely  amazed  and 
even  interested  now. 

Lady  Grace  stuck  to  her  word.  "That's  what  it 
seems  to  me  I" 

"It  seems  to  you" — and  his  sarcasm  here  was  easy 
— "more  disloyal  to  sell  a  picture  than  to  buy  one? 
Because  we  didn't  paint  'em  all  ourselves,  you  know!" 

She  threw  up  impatient  hands.  "I  don't  ask  you 
either  to  paint  or  to  buy !" 

"Oh,  that's  a  mercy!"  he  interrupted,  riding  his 
irony  hard;  "and  I'm  glad  to  hear  you  at  least  let 


THE  OUTCRY 

me  off  such  efforts !  However,  if  it  strikes  you  as  grace 
fully  filial  to  apply  to  your  father's  conduct  so  invidi 
ous  a  word,"  he  went  on  less  scathingly,  "you  must 
take  from  him,  in  your  turn,  his  quite  other  view  of 
what  makes  disloyalty — understanding  distinctly,  by 
the  same  token,  that  he  enjoins  on  you  not  to  give  an 
odious  illustration  of  it,  while  he's  away,  by  discuss 
ing  and  deploring  with  any  one  of  your  extraordinary 
friends  any  aspect  or  feature  whatever  of  his  walk  and 
conversation.  That — pressed  as  I  am  for  time,"  he 
went  on  with  a  glance  at  his  watch  while  she  remained 
silent — "is  the  main  sense  of  what  I  have  to  say  to  you; 
so  that  I  count  on  your  perfect  conformity.  When 
you  have  told  me  that  I  may  so  count" — and  casting 
about  for  his  hat  he  espied  it  and  went  to  take  it  up 
— "I  shall  more  cordially  bid  you  good-bye." 

His  daughter  looked  as  if  she  had  been  for  some  time 
expecting  the  law  thus  imposed  upon  her — had  been 
seeing  where  he  must  come  out;  but  in  spite  of  this 
preparation  she  made  him  wait  for  his  reply  in  such 
tension  as  he  had  himself  created.  "To  Kitty  I've 
practically  said  nothing — and  she  herself  can  tell  you 
why:  I've  in  fact  scarcely  seen  her  this  fortnight. 
Putting  aside  then  Amy  Sandgate,  the  only  person  to 
whom  I've  spoken — of  your  'sacrifice,'  as  I  suppose 
you'll  let  me  call  it  ? — is  Mr.  Hugh  Crimble,  whom  you 
talk  of  as  my  '  confederate '  at  Dedborough." 

168 


THE  OUTCRY 

Lord  Theign  recovered  the  name  with  relief.  "  Mr. 
Hugh  Crimble — that's  it! — whom  you  so  amazingly 
caused  to  be  present,  and  apparently  invited  to  be 
active,  at  a  business  that  so  little  concerned  him." 

"He  certainly  took  upon  himself  to  be  interested, 
as  I  had  hoped  he  would.  But  it  was  because  I  had 
taken  upon  my  self " 

"To  act,  yes,"  Lord  Theign  broke  in,  "with  the 
grossest  want  of  delicacy!  Well,  it's  from  that  ex 
actly  that  you'll  now  forbear;  and  'interested'  as  he 
may  be — for  which  I'm  deucedly  obliged  to  him! — 
you'll  not  speak  to  Mr.  Crimble  again." 

"Never  again?" — the  girl  put  it  as  for  full  certi 
tude. 

"Never  of  the  question  that  I  thus  exclude.  You 
may  chatter  your  fill,"  said  his  lordship  curtly,  "about 
any  others." 

"Why,  the  particular  question  you  forbid,"  Grace 
returned  with  great  force,  but  as  if  saying  something 
very  reasonable — "that  question  is  the  question  we 
care  about:  it's  our  very  ground  of  conversation." 

"Then,"  her  father  decreed,  "your  conversation  will 
please  to  dispense  with  a  ground;  or  you'll  perhaps, 
better  still — if  that's  the  only  way! — dispense  with 
your  conversation." 

Lady  Grace  took  a  moment  as  if  to  examine  this 
more  closely.  "You  require  of  me  not  to  communi 
cate  with  Mr.  Crimble  at  all?" 

169 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Most  assuredly  I  require  it — since  it's  to  that  you 
insist  on  reducing  me."  He  didn't  look  reduced,  the 
master  of  Dedborough,  as  he  spoke — which  was  doubt 
less  precisely  because  he  held  his  head  so  high  to  affirm 
what  he  suffered.  "Is  it  so  essential  to  your  com 
fort,"  he  demanded,  "to  hear  him,  or  to  make  him, 
abuse  me?" 

"  'Abusing'  you,  father  dear,  has  nothing  whatever 
to  do  with  it!" — his  daughter  had  fairly  lapsed,  with 
a  despairing  gesture,  to  the  tenderness  involved  in  her 
compassion  for  his  perversity.  "We  look  at  the  thing 
in  a  much  larger  way,"  she  pursued,  not  heeding  that 
she  drew  from  him  a  sound  of  scorn  for  her  "larger." 
"It's  of  our  Treasure  itself  we  talk — and  of  what  can 
be  done  in  such  cases;  though  with  a  close  application, 
I  admit,  to  the  case  that  you  embody." 

"Ah,"  Lord  Theign  asked  as  with  absurd  curiosity, 
"I  embody  a  case?" 

"Wonderfully,  father — as  you  do  everything;  and 
it's  the  fact  of  its  being  exceptional,"  she  explained, 
"that  makes  it  so  difficult  to  deal  with." 

His  lordship  had  a  gape  for  it.  "  'To  deal  with'? 
You're  undertaking  to  'deal'  with  me?" 

She  smiled  more  frankly  now,  as  for  a  rift  in  the 
gloom.  "Well,  how  can  we  help  it  if  you  will  be  a 
case?"  And  then  as  her  tone  but  visibly  darkened 
his  wonder:  "What  we've  set  our  hearts  on  is  saving 
the  picture." 

170 


THE  OUTCRY 

"  What  you've  set  your  hearts  on,  in  other  words,  is 
working  straight  against  me?" 

But  she  persisted  without  heat.  "What  we've  set 
our  hearts  on  is  working  for  England." 

"And  pray  who  in  the  world's  'England,'"  he  cried 
in  his  stupefaction,  "unless  /  am?" 

"Dear,  dear  father,"  she  pleaded,  "that's  all  we 
want  you  to  be!  I  mean" — she  didn't  fear  firmly  to 
force  it  home — "in  the  real,  the  right,  the  grand  sense; 
the  sense  that,  you  see,  is  so  intensely  ours." 

"  'Ours'?" — he  couldn't  but  again  throw  back  her 
word  at  her.  "Isn't  it,  damn  you,  just  in  ours ?" 

"No,  no,"  she  interrupted — "not  in  ours!"  She 
smiled  at  him  still,  though  it  was  strained,  as  if  he 
really  ought  to  perceive. 

But  he  glared  as  at  a  senseless  juggle.  "What  and 
who  the  devil  are  you  talking  about?  What  are  'we,' 
the  whole  blest  lot  of  us,  pray,  but  the  best  and  most 
English  thing  in  the  country:  people  walking — and 
riding! — straight;  doing,  disinterestedly,  most  of  the 
difficult  and  all  the  thankless  jobs;  minding  their  own 
business,  above  all,  and  expecting  others  to  mind 
theirs?"  So  he  let  her  "have"  the  stout  sound  truth, 
as  it  were — and  so  the  direct  force  of  it  clearly  might, 
by  his  view,  have  made  her  reel.  "  You  and  I,  my  lady, 
and  your  two  decent  brothers,  God  be  thanked  for 
them,  and  mine  into  the  bargain,  and  all  the  rest,  the 

171 


THE  OUTCRY 

jolly  lot  of  us,  take  us  together — make  us  numerous 
enough  without  any  foreign  aid  or  mixture:  if  that's 
what  I  understand  you  to  mean!" 

"You  don't  understand  me  at  all — evidently;  and 
above  all  I  see  you  don't  want  to!"  she  had  the  bra 
very  to  add.  "By  'our'  sense  of  what's  due  to  the 
nation  in  such  a  case  I  mean  Mr.  Crimble's  and  mine 
— and  nobody's  else  at  all;  since,  as  I  tell  you,  it's  only 
with  him  I've  talked." 

It  gave  him  then,  every  inch  of  him  showed,  the  full, 
the  grotesque  measure  of  the  scandal  he  faced.  "So 
that  'you  and  Mr.  Crimble'  represent  the  standard, 
for  me,  in  your  opinion,  of  the  proprieties  and  duties 
of  our  house?" 

Well,  she  was  too  earnest — as  she  clearly  wished  to 
let  him  see — to  mind  his  perversion  of  it.     "  I  express 
to  you  the  way  we  feel." 

"It's  most  striking  to  hear,  certainly,  what  you  ex 
press" — he  had  positively  to  laugh  for  it;  "and  you 
speak  of  him,  with  your  insufferable '  we,'  as  if  you  were 
presenting  him  as  your — God  knows  what!  You've 
enjoyed  a  large  exchange  of  ideas,  I  gather,  to  have 
arrived  at  such  unanimity."  And  then,  as  if  to  fall 
into  no  trap  he  might  somehow  be  laying  for  her,  she 
dropped  all  eagerness  and  rebutted  nothing:  "You 
must  see  a  great  deal  of  your  fellow-critic  not  to  be  able 
to  speak  of  yourself  without  him!" 

172 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Yes,  we're  fellow-critics,  father" — she  accepted 
this  opening.  "I  perfectly  adopt  your  term."  But 
it  took  her  a  minute  to  go  further.  "  I  saw  Mr.  Crim- 
ble  here  half  an  hour  ago." 

"Saw  him  'here'?"  Lord  Theign  amazedly  asked. 
"  He  comes  to  you  here — and  Amy  Sandgate  has  been 
silent?" 

"It  wasn't  her  business  to  tell  you — since,  you  see, 
she  could  leave  it  to  me.  And  I  quite  expect,"  Lady 
Grace  then  produced,  "that  he'll  come  again." 

It  brought  down  with  a  bang  all  her  father's  au 
thority.  "Then  I  simply  exact  of  you  that  you  don't 
see  him." 

The  pause  of  which  she  paid  it  the  deference  was 
charged  like  a  brimming  cup.  "Is  that  what  you 
really  meant  by  your  condition  just  now — that  when 
I  do  see  him  I  shall  not  speak  to  him?" 

"What  I ' really  meant'  is  what  I  really  mean — that 
you  bow  to  the  law  I  lay  upon  you  and  drop  the  man 
altogether." 

"  Have  nothing  to  do  with  him  at  all  ?  " 

"Have  nothing  to  do  with  him  at  all." 

"In  fact" — she  took  it  in — "give  him  wholly  up." 

He  had  an  impatient  gesture.  "You  sound  as  if 
I  asked  you  to  give  up  a  fortune!"  And  then,  though 
she  had  phrased  his  idea  without  consternation — 
verily  as  if  it  had  been  in  the  balance  for  her — he  might 


THE  OUTCRY 

have  been  moved  by  something  that  gathered  in  her 
eyes.  "  You're  so  wrapped  up  in  him  that  the  precious 
sacrifice  is  like  that  sort  of  thing?" 

Lady  Grace  took  her  time — but  showed,  as  her  eyes 
continued  to  hold  him,  what  had  gathered.  "I  like 
Mr.  Crimble  exceedingly,  father — I  think  him  clever, 
intelligent,  good;  I  want  what  he  wants — I  want  it, 
I  think,  really,  as  much;  and  I  don't  at  all  deny  that 
he  has  helped  to  make  me  so  want  it.  But  that  doesn't 
matter.  I'll  wholly  cease  to  see  him,  I'll  give  him  up 
forever,  if — if — !"  She  faltered,  however,  she  hung 
fire  with  a  smile  that  anxiously,  intensely  appealed. 
Then  she  began  and  stopped  again,  "If — if — !"  while 
her  father  caught  her  up  with  irritation. 

"  '  If,'  my  lady  ?    If  what,  please  ? " 

"  If  you'll  withdraw  the  offer  of  our  picture  to  Mr. 
Bender — and  never  make  another  to  any  one  else!" 

He  stood  staring  as  at  the  size  of  it — then  translated 
it  into  his  own  terms.  "If  I'll  obligingly  announce 
to  the  world  that  I've  made  an  ass  of  myself  you'll 
kindly  forbear  from  your  united  effort — the  charming 
pair  of  you — to  show  me  up  for  one?" 

Lady  Grace,  as  if  consciously  not  caring  or  at 
tempting  to  answer  this,  simply  gave  the  first  flare  of 
his  criticism  time  to  drop.  It  wasn't  till  a  minute 
passed  that  she  said :  "  You  don't  agree  to  my  com 
promise?" 


THE  OUTCRY 

Ah,  the  question  but  fatally  sharpened  at  a  stroke  the 
stiffness  of  his  spirit.  "Good  God,  I'm  to  ' compro 
mise'  on  top  of  everything? — I'm  to  let  you  browbeat 
me,  haggle  and  bargain  with  me,  over  a  thing  that  I'm 
entitled  to  settle  with  you  as  things  have  ever  been  set- 
\  >  tied  among  us,  by  uttering  to  you  my  last  parental 
word?" 

"You  don't  care  enough  then  for  what  you 
name?" — she  took  it  up  as  scarce  heeding  now  what 
he  said. 

"For  putting  an  end  to  your  odious  commerce — ? 
I  give  you  the  measure,  on  the  contrary,"  said  Lord 
Theign,  "of  how  much  I  care:  as  you  give  me,  very 
strangely  indeed,  it  strikes  me,  that  of  what  it  costs 
you — !"  But  his  other  words  were  lost  in  the  hard 
long  look  at  her  from  which  he  broke  off  in  turn  as 
for  disgust. 

It  was  with  an  effect  of  decently  shielding  herself — 
the  unuttered  meaning  came  so  straight — that  she 
substituted  w^ords  of  her  own.  "  Of  what  it  costs  me 
to  redeem  the  picture?" 

"To  lose  your  tenth-rate  friend" — he  spoke  without 
scruple  now. 

She  instantly  broke  into  ardent  deprecation,  plead 
ing  at  once  and  warning.  "Father,  father,  oh — ! 
You  hold  the  thing  in  your  hands." 

He  pulled  up  before  her  again  as  to  thrust  the  re- 
175 


THE  OUTCRY 

sponsibility  straight  back.  "My  orders  then  are  so 
much  rubbish  to  you?" 

Lady  Grace  held  her  ground,  and  they  remained 
face  to  face  in  opposition  and  accusation,  neither  ma 
king  the  other  the  sign  of  peace.  But  the  girl  at  least 
had,  in  her  way,  held  out  the  olive-branch,  while  Lord 
Theign  had  but  reaffirmed  his  will.  It  was  for  her 
acceptance  of  this  that  he  searched  her,  her  last  word 
not  having  yet  come.  Before  it  had  done  so,  however, 
the  door  from  the  lobby  opened  and  Mr.  Gotch  had 
regained  their  presence.  This  appeared  to  determine 
in  Lady  Grace  a  view  of  the  importance  of  delay, 
which  she  signified  to  her  companion  in  a  "Well — 
I  must  think!"  For  the  butler  positively  resounded, 
and  Hugh  was  there. 

"Mr.  Crimble!"  Mr.  Gotch  proclaimed— with  the 
further  extravagance  of  projecting  the  visitor  straight 
upon  his  lordship. 

VII 

OUR  young  man  showed  another  face  than  the  face 
his  friend  had  lately  seen  him  carry  off,  and  he  now 
turned  it  distressfully  from  that  source  of  inspiration 
to  Lord  Theign,  who  was  flagrantly,  even  from  this 
first  moment,  no  such  source  at  all,  and  then  from  his 
noble  adversary  back  again,  under  pressure  of  diffi 
culty  and  effort,  to  Lady  Grace,  whom  he  directly  ad- 

176 


THE  OUTCRY 

dressed.  "  Here  I  am  again,  you  see — and  I've  got  my 
news,  worse  luck!"  But  his  manner  to  her  father  was 
the  next  instant  more  brisk.  "  I  learned  you  were  here, 
my  lord;  but  as  the  case  is  important  I  told  them  it 
was  all  right  and  came  up.  I've  been  to  my  club," 
he  added  for  the  girl,  "and  found  the  tiresome 
thing — !"  But  he  broke  down  breathless. 

"And  it  isn't  good?"  she  cried  with  the  highest  con 
cern. 

Ruefully,  yet  not  abjectly,  he  confessed,  "Not  so 
good  as  I  hoped.  For  I  assure  you,  my  lord,  I 
counted " 

"It's  the  report  from  Pappendick  about  the  picture 
at  Verona,"  Lady  Grace  interruptingly  explained. 

Hugh  took  it  up,  but,  as  we  should  well  have  seen, 
under  embarrassment  dismally  deeper;  the  ugly  par 
ticular  defeat  he  had  to  announce  showing  thus,  in  his 
thought,  for  a  more  awkward  force  than  any  reviving 
possibilities  that  he  might  have  begun  to  balance 
against  them.  "The  man  I  told  you  about  also,"  he 
said  to  his  formidable  patron;  "whom  I  went  to  Brus 
sels  to  talk  with  and  who,  most  kindly,  has  gone  for 
us  to  Verona.  He  has  been  able  to  get  straight  at 
their  Mantovano,  but  the  brute  horribly  wires  me  that 
he  doesn't  quite  see  the  thing;  see,  I  mean" — and  he 
gathered  his  two  hearers  together  now  in  his  overflow 
of  chagrin,  conscious,  with  his  break  of  the  ice,  more 

177 


THE  OUTCRY 

exclusively  of  that — "my  vivid  vital  point,  the  abso 
lute  screaming  identity  of  the  two  persons  represented. 
I  still  hold/'  he  persuasively  went  on,  "that  our  man  is 
their  man,  but  Pappendick  decides  that  he  isn't — and 
as  Pappendick  has  so  much  to  be  reckoned  with  of 
course  I'm  awfully  abashed." 

Lord  Theign  had  remained  what  he  had  begun  by 
being,  immeasurably  and  inaccessibly  detached — only 
with  his  curiosity  more  moved  than  he  could  help 
and  as,  on  second  thought,  to  see  what  sort  of  a  still 
more  offensive  fool  the  heated  youth  would  really 
make  of  himself.  "Yes — you  seem  indeed  remark 
ably  abashed!"  * 

Hugh  clearly  was  thrown  again,  by  the  cold  "cut"  of 
this,  colder  than  any  mere  social  ignoring,  upon  a 
sense  of  the  damnably  poor  figure  he  did  offer;  so 
that,  while  he  straightened  himself  and  kept  a  mastery 
of  his  manner  and  a  control  of  his  reply,  we  should  yet 
have  felt  his  cheek  tingle.  "I  backed  my  own  judg 
ment  strongly,  I  know — and  I've  got  my  snub.  But  I 
don't  in  the  least  knock  under." 

"  Only  the  first  authority  in  Europe  doesn't  care,  I 
suppose,  whether  you  do  or  not!" 

"He  isn't  the  first  authority  in  Europe,  thank  God," 
the  young  man  returned — "  though  he  is,  I  admit,  one 
of  the  three  or  four  first.  And  I  mean  to  appeal — I've 
another  shot  in  my  locker,"  he  went  on  with  his  rather 

178 


THE  OUTCRY 

painfully  forced  smile  to  Lady  Grace.  "I  had  al 
ready  written,  you  see,  to  dear  old  Bardi." 

"Bardi  of  Milan?" — she  recognised,  it  was  admi 
rably  manifest,  the  appeal  of  his  directness  to  her  gen 
erosity,  awkward  as  their  predicament  was  also  for  her 
herself,  and  spoke  to  him  as  she  might  have  spoken 
without  her  father's  presence. 

It  would  have  shown  for  beautiful,  on  the  spot,  had 
there  beeen  any  one  to  perceive  it,  that  he  devoutly  re 
corded  her  intelligence.  "You  know  of  him? — how 
delightful  of  you!  For  the  Italians,  I  now  feel,"  he 
quickly  explained,  "  he  must  have  most  the  instinct— 
and  it  has  come  over  me  since  that  he'd  have  been 
more  our  man.  -  Besides  of  course  his  so  knowing  the 
Verona  picture." 

She  had  fairly  hung  on  his  lips.  "But  does  he 
know  ours?" 

"No — not  ours  yet.  That  is" — he  consciously  and 
quickly  took  himself  up — "not  yours!  But  as  Pap- 
pendick  went  to  Verona  for  us  I've  asked  Bardi  to  do  us 
the  great  favour  to  come  here — if  Lord  Theign  will  be 
so  good,"  he  said,  bethinking  himself  with  a  turn,  "as 
to  let  him  examine  the  Moretto."  He  faced  again  to 
the  personage  he  mentioned,  who,  simply  standing  off 
and  watching,  in  concentrated  interest  as  well  as  de 
tachment,  this  interview  of  his  cool  daughter  and 
her  still  cooler  guest,  had  plainly  "elected,"  as  it  were, 

179 


THE  OUTCRY 

to  give  them  rope  to  hang  themselves.  Staring  very 
hard  at  Hugh  he  met  his  appeal,  but  in  a  silence  clearly 
calculated;  against  which,  however,  the  young  man, 
bearing  up,  made  such  head  as  he  could.  He  offered 
his  next  word,  that  is,  equally  to  the  two  companions. 
"It's  not  at  all  impossible — for  such  curious  effects 
have  been! — that  the  Dedborough  picture  seen  after 
the  Verona  will  point  a  different  moral  from  the  Ve 
rona  seen  after  the  Dedborough." 

"And  so  awfully  long  after — wasn't  it?"  Lady 
Grace  asked. 

"Awfully  long  after — it  was  years  ago  that  Pappen- 
dick,  being  in  this  country  for  such  purposes,  was 
kindly  admitted  to  your  house  when  none  of  you  were 
there,  or  at  least  visible." 

"Oh  of  course  we  don't  see  every  one!" — she  hero 
ically  kept  it  up. 

"You  don't  see  every  one,"  Hugh  bravely  laughed, 
"and  that  makes  it  all  the  more  charming  that  you  did, 
and  that  you  still  do,  see  me.  I  shall  really  get  Bardi," 
he  pursued,  "  to  go  again  to  Verona " 

"The  last  thing  before  coming  here?" — she  had 
guessed  before  he  could  say  it;  and  still  she  sustained 
it,  so  that  he  could  shine  at  her  for  assent.  "How 
happy  they  should  like  so  to  work  for  you!" 

"Ah,  we're  a  band  of  brothers,"  he  returned — "'we 
v  few,  we  happy  few' — from  country  to  country";  to 

1 80 


THE  OUTCRY 

which  he  added,  gaining  more  ease  for  an  eye  at  Lord 
Theign:  "  though  we  do  have  our  little  rubs  and  dis 
putes,  like  Pappendick  and  me  now.  The  thing,  you 
see,  is  the  ripping  interest  of  it  all;  since,"  he  developed 
and  explained,  for  his  elder  friend's  benefit,  with  per 
tinacious  cheer  and  an  assurance  superficially  at  least 
recovered,  awhen  we're  really  'hit'  over  a  case  we'll  do 
almost  anything  in  life." 

Lady  Grace,  recklessly  throbbing  in  the  breath  of 
it  all,  immediately  appropriated  what  her  father  let 
alone.  "  It  must  be  so  lovely  to  feel  so  hit! " 

"It  does  spoil  one,"  Hugh  laughed,  " for  milder  joys. 
Of  course  what  I  have  to  consider  is  the  chance — 
putting  it  at  the  merest  chance — of  Bardi's  own  wet 
blanket!  But  that's  again  so  very  small — though,"  he 
pulled  up  with  a  drop  to  the  comparative  dismal,  which 
he  offered  as  an  almost  familiar  tribute  to  Lord  Theign, 
"you'll  retort  upon  me  naturally  that  I  promised  you 
the  possibility  of  Pappendick's  veto  would  be:  all  on 
the  poor  dear  old  basis,  you'll  claim,  of  the  wish  father 
to  the  thought.  Well,  I  do  wish  to  be  right  as  much  as 
I  believe  I  am.  Only  give  me  time!"  he  sublimely 
insisted. 

"  How  can  we  prevent  your  using  it  ?  "  Lady  Grace 
again  interrupted;  "or  the  fact  either  that  if  the  worst 
comes  to  the  worst " 

"The  thing" — he  at  once  pursued — "will  always  be 
181 


THE  OUTCRY 

at  the  least  the  greatest  of  Morettos  ?  Ah,"  he  cried  so 
cheerily  that  there  was  still  a  freedom  in  it  toward  any 
it  might  concern,  "the  worst  sha'n't  come  to  the  worst, 
but  the  best  to  the  best:  my  conviction  of  which  it  is 
that  supports  me  in  the  deep  regret  I  have  to  express'' 
— and  he  faced  Lord  Theign  again — "for  any  incon 
venience  I  may  have  caused  you  by  my  abortive  under 
taking.  That,  I  vow  here  before  Lady  Grace,  I  will 
yet  more  than  make  up!" 

Lord  Theign,  after  the  longest  but  the  blankest  con 
templation  of  him,  broke  hereupon,  for  the  first  time, 
that  attitude  of  completely  sustained  and  separate  si 
lence  which  he  had  yet  made  compatible  with  his  air  of 
having  deeply  noted  every  element  of  the  scene — so 
that  it  was  of  this  full  view  his  participation  had  effec 
tively  consisted.  "I  haven't  the  least  idea,  sir,  what 
you're  talking  about!"  And  he  squarely  turned  his 
back,  strolling  toward  the  other  room,  the  threshold  of 
which  he  the  next  moment  had  passed,  remaining  scan 
tily  within,  however,  and  in  sight  of  the  others,  not  to 
say  of  ourselves;  even  though  averted  and  ostensibly 
lost  in  some  scrutiny  that  might  have  had  for  its  object 
the  great  enshrined  Lawrence. 

There  ensued  upon  his  words  and  movement  a  vivid 
mute  passage,  the  richest  of  commentaries,  between  his 
companions;  who,  deeply  divided  by  the  width  of  the 
ample  room,  followed  him  with  their  eyes  and  then 

182 


THE  OUTCRY 

used  for  their  own  interchange  these  organs  of  remark, 
eloquent  now  over  Hugh's  unmistakable  dismissal  at 
short  order,  on  which  obviously  he  must  at  once  act. 
Lady  Grace's  young  arms  conveyed  to  him  by  a  de 
spairing  contrite  motion  of  surrender  that  she  had 
done  for  him  all  she  could  do  in  his  presence  and  that, 
however  sharply  doubtful  the  result,  he  was  to  leave  the 
rest  to  herself.  They  communicated  thus,  the  strenuous 
pair,  for  their  full  moment,  without  speaking;  only 
with  the  prolonged,  the  charged  give  and  take  of  their 
gaze  and,  it  might  well  have  been  imagined,  of  their 
passion.  Hugh  had  for  an  instant  a  show  of  hesitation 
— of  the  arrested  impulse,  while  he  kept  her  father 
within  range,  to  launch  at  that  personage  before  going 
some  final  remonstrance.  It  was  the  girl's  raised  hand 
and  gesture  of  warning  that  waved  away  for  him  such 
a  mistake;  he  decided,  under  her  pressure,  and  after  a 
last  searching  and  answering  look  at  her  reached  the 
door  and  let  himself  out.  The  stillness  was  then  pro 
longed  a  minute  by  the  further  wait  of  the  two  others, 
Lord  Theign  where  he  had  been  standing  and  his 
daughter  on  the  spot  from  which  she  had  not  moved. 
It  presently  ended  in  his  lordship's  turn  about  as  if  in 
ferring  by  the  silence  that  the  intruder  had  withdrawn. 

"Is  that  young  man  your  lover?"  he  said  as  he  drew 
again  near. 

Lady  Grace  waited  a  little,  but  spoke  as  quietly  as  if 
183 


THE  OUTCRY 

she  had  been  prepared.     "  Has  the  question  a  bearing 
on  the  promise  you  a  short  time  ago  demanded  of  me  ?  " 

"  It  has  a  bearing  on  the  so  extraordinary  appearance 
of  your  intimacy  with  him!" 

"  You  mean  that  if  he  should  be — what  you  ask  me 
about — your  exaction  would  then  be  modified  ?" 

" My  request  that  you  break  it  short  off?  That  re 
quest  would,  on  the  contrary,"  Lord  Theign  pro 
nounced,  "rest  on  an  immense  new  ground.  There 
fore  I  insist  on  your  telling  me  the  truth." 

"Won't  the  truth  be  before  you,  father,  if  you'll 
think  a  moment — without  extravagance?"  After 
which,  while,  as  stiffly  as  ever — and  it  probably  seemed 
to  her  impatience  as  stupidly — he  didn't  rise  to  it,  she 
went  on:  "If  I  offered  you  not  again  to  see  him,  does 
that  make  for  you  the  appearance ?" 

"If  you  offered  it,  you  mean,  on  your  condition — my 
promising  not  to  sell  ?  I  promised,"  said  Lord  Theign, 
"absolutely  nothing  at  all!" 

She  took  him  up  with  all  expression.  "  So  I  promised 
as  little !  But  that  I  should  have  been  able  to  say  what 
I  did  sufficiently  meets  your  curiosity." 

She  might,  wronged  as  she  held  herself,  have  felt  him 
stupid  not  to  see  how  wronged;  but  he  was  in  any 
case  acute  for  an  evasion.  "You  risked  your  offer 
for  the  great  equivalent  over  which  you've  so  wildly 
worked  yourself  up." 

184 


THE  OUTCRY 

"  Yes,  I've  worked  myself — that,  I  grant  you  and 
don't  blush  for!  But  hardly  so  much  as  to  renounce 
my  'lover' — if,"  she  prodigiously  smiled,  "I  were  so 
fortunate  as  to  have  one!" 

"You  renounced  poor  John  mightily  easily — whom 
you  were  so  fortunate  as  to  have!" 

Her  brows  rose  as  high  as  his  own  had  ever  done. 
"Do  you  call  Lord  John  my  lover?" 

"He  was  your  suitor  most  assuredly,"  Lord  Theign 
inimitably  said,  though  without  looking  at  her;  "and 
as  strikingly  encouraged  as  he  was  respectfully  ar 
dent!" 

"Encouraged  by  you,  dear  father,  beyond  doubt!" 

"  Encouraged — er — by  every  one :  because  you  were 
(yes,  you  were  /)  encouraging.  And  what  I  ask  of 
you  now  is  a  word  of  common  candour  as  to  whether 
you  didn't,  on  your  honour,  turn  him  off  because  of 
your  just  then  so  stimulated  views  on  the  person  who 
has  been  with  us." 

Grace  replied  but  after  an  instant,  as  moved  by  more 
things  than  she  could  say — moved  above  all,  in  her 
trouble  and  her  pity  for  him,  by  other  things  than  harsh 
ness:  "Oh  father,  father,  father !" 

He  searched  her  through  all  the  compassion  of  her 
cry,  but  appeared  to  give  way  to  her  sincerity.  "  Well 
then  if  I  have  your  denial  I  take  it  as  answering  my 
whole  question — in  a  manner  that  satisfies  me.  If 

185 


THE  OUTCRY 

there's  nothing,  on  your  word,  of  that  sort  between  you, 
you  can  all  the  more  drop  him." 

"But  you  said  a  moment  ago  that  I  should  all  the 
more  in  the  other  case — that  of  there  being  something! " 

He  brushed  away  her  logic-chopping.  "If  you're 
so  keen  then  for  past  remarks  I  take  up  your  own  words 
— I  accept  your  own  terms  for  your  putting  an  end 
to  Mr.  Crimble."  To  which,  while,  turning  pale,  she 
said  nothing,  he  added:  "You  recognise  that  you  pro 
fess  yourself  ready " 

"Not  again  to  see  him,"  she  now  answered,  "if  you 
tell  me  the  picture's  safe  ?  Yes,  I  recognise  that  I  was 
ready — as  well  as  how  scornfully  little  you  then  were!" 

"Never  mind  what  I  then  was — the  question's  of 
what  I  actually  am,  since  I  close  with  you  on  it.  The 
picture's  therefore  as  safe  as  you  please,"  Lord  Theign 
pursued,  "  if  you'll  do  what  you  just  now  engaged  to." 

"I  engaged  to  do  nothing,"  she  replied  after  a  pause; 
and  the  face  she  turned  to  him  had  grown  suddenly 
tragic.  "I've  no  word  to  take  back,  for  none  passed 
between  us;  but  I  won't  do  what  I  mentioned  and  what 
you  at  once  laughed  at.  Because,"  she  finished,  "the 
case  is  different." 

"  Different  ?  "  he  almost  shouted—"  how,  different  ?  " 

She  didn't  look  at  him  for  it,  but  she  was  none  the 
less  strongly  distinct.  "He  has  been  here — and  that 
has  done  it.  He  knows,"  she  admirably  emphasised. 

186 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Knows  what  I  think  of  him,  no  doubt — for  a 
brazen  young  prevaricator!  But  what  else?" 

She  still  kept  her  eyes  on  a  far-off  point.  "What 
he  will  have  seen — that  I  feel  we're  too  good  friends." 

"Then  your  denial  of  it's  false,"  her  father  fairly 
thundered — "and  you  are  infatuated?" 

It  made  her  the  more  quiet.    "  I  like  him  very  much." 

"So  that  your  row  about  the  picture,"  he  demanded 
with  passion,  "has  been  all  a  blind?"  And  then  as 
her  quietness  still  held  her:  "And  his  a  blind  as  much 
— to  help  him  to  get  at  you?" 

She  looked  at  him  again  now.  "  He  must  speak  for 
himself.  I've  said  what  I  mean." 

"  But  what  the  devil  do  you  mean  ?"  Lord  Theign, 
taking  in  the  hour,  had  reached  the  door  as  in  su 
premely  baffled  conclusion  and  with  a  sense  of  time 
lamentably  lost. 

Their  eyes  met  upon  it  all  dreadfully  across  the  wide 
space,  and,  hurried  and  incommoded  as  she  saw  him, 
she  yet  made  him  still  stand  a  minute.  Then  she 
let  everything  go.  "Do  what  you  like  with  the  pic 
ture!" 

He  jerked  up  his  arm  and  guarding  hand  as  before 
a  levelled  blow  at  his  face,  and  with  the  other  hand 
flung  open  the  door,  having  done  with  her  now  and 
immediately  lost  to  sight.  Left  alone  she  stood  a 
moment  looking  before  her;  then  with  a  vague  ad- 

J87 


THE  OUTCRY 

vance,  held  apparently  by  a  quickly  growing  sense  of 
the  implication  of  her  act,  reached  a  table  where  she 
remained  a  little,  deep  afresh  in  thought — only  the 
next  thing  to  fall  into  a  chair  close  to  it  and  there, 
with  her  elbows  on  it,  yield  to  the  impulse  of  covering 
her  flushed  face  with  her  hands. 


188 


BOOK  THIRD 


TJUGH  CRIMBLE  waited  again  in  the  Bruton 
•^  •*  Street  drawing-room — this  time  at  the  afternoon 
hour;  he  restlessly  shifted  his  place,  looked  at  things 
about  him  without  seeing  them;  all  he  saw,  all  he  out 
wardly  studied,  was  his  own  face  and  figure  as  he 
stopped  an  instant  before  a  long  glass  suspended  be 
tween  two  windows.  Just  as  he  turned  from  that  brief 
and  perhaps  not  wholly  gratified  inspection  Lady 
Grace — that  he  had  sent  up  his  name  to  whom  was 
immediately  apparent — presented  herself  at  the  en 
trance  from  the  other  room.  These  young  persons 
had  hereupon  no  instant  exchange  of  words;  their 
exchange  was  mute — they  but  paused  where  they  were; 
while  the  silence  of  each  evidently  tested  the  other  for 
full  confidence.  A  measure  of  this  comfort  came  first, 
it  would  have  appeared,  to  Hugh;  though  he  then  at 
once  asked  for  confirmation  of  it. 

"Am  I  right,  Lady  Grace,  am  I  right? — to  have 
come,  I  mean,  after  so  many  days  of  not  hearing,  not 
knowing,  and  perhaps,  all  too  stupidly,  not  trying." 
And  he  went  on  as,  still  with  her  eyes  on  him,  she  didn't 
speak;  though,  only,  we  should  have  guessed,  from  her 
stress  of  emotion.  "Even  if  I'm  wrong,  let  me  tell 

191 


THE  OUTCRY 

you,  I  don't  care — simply  because,  whatever  new  diffi 
culty  I  may  have  brought  about  for  you  here  a  fort 
night  ago,  there's  something  that  to-day  adds  to  my 
doubt  and  my  fear  too  great  a  pang,  and  that  has  made 
me  feel  I  can  scarce  bear  the  suspense  of  them  as  they 
are." 

The  girl  came  nearer,  and  if  her  grave  face  expressed 
a  pity  it  yet  declined  a  dread.  "Of  what  suspense 
do  you  speak?  Your  still  being  without  the  other 
opinion ?" 

"  Ah,  that  worries  me,  yes;  and  all  the  more,  at  this 
hour,  as  I  say,  that — "  He  dropped  it,  however: 
"I'll  tell  you  in  a  moment!  My  real  torment,  all  the 
while,  has  been  not  to  know,  from  day  to  day,  what 
situation,  what  complication  that  last  scene  of  ours 
with  your  father  here  has  let  you  in  for;  and  yet  at  the 
same  time — having  no  sign  nor  sound  from  you! — to 
see  the  importance  of  not  making  anything  possibly 
worse  by  approaching  you  again,  however  discreetly. 
I've  been  in  the  dark,"  he  pursued,  "and  feeling  that 
I  must  leave  you  there;  so  that  now — just  brutally 
turning  up  once  more  under  personal  need  and  at  any 
cost — I  don't  know  whether  I  most  want  or  most  fear 
what  I  may  learn  from  you." 

Lady  Grace,  listening  and  watching,  appeared  to 
choose  between  different  ways  of  meeting  this  appeal; 
she  had  a  pacifying,  postponing  gesture,  marked  with 

192 


THE  OUTCRY 

a  beautiful  authority,  a  sign  of  the  value  for  her  of 
what  she  gave  precedence  to  and  which  waved  off 
everything  else.  "Have  you  had — first  of  all — any 
news  yet  of  Bardi?" 

"That  I  have  is  what  has  driven  me  straight  at  you 
again — since  I've  shown  you  before  how  I  turn  to  you 
at  a  crisis.  He  has  come  as  I  hoped  and  like  a  reg 
ular  good  *un,"  Hugh  was  able  to  state;  "I've  just 
met  him  at  the  station,  but  I  pick  him  up  again,  at 
his  hotel  in  Clifford  Street,  at  five.  He  stopped,  on 
his  way  from  Dover  this  morning,  to  my  extreme  ex 
asperation,  to  ' sample'  Canterbury,  and  I  leave  him 
to  a  bath  and  a  change  and  tea.  Then  swooping  down 
I  whirl  him  round  to  Bond  Street,  where  his  very  first 
apprehension  of  the  thing  (an  apprehension,  oh  I 
guarantee  you,  so  quick  and  clean  and  fine  and  wise) 
will  be  the  flash-light  projected — well,"  said  the  young 
man,  to  wind  up  handsomely,  but  briefly  and  reason 
ably,  "over  the  whole  field  of  our  question." 

She  panted  with  comprehension.  "  That  of  the  two 
portraits  being  but  the  one  sitter!" 

"That  of  the  two  portraits  being  but  the  one  sitter. 
With  everything  so  to  the  good,  more  and  more,  that 
bangs  in,  up  to  the  head,  the  golden  nail  of  authen 
ticity,  and" — he  quite  glowed  through  his  gloom  for 
it — "  we  take  our  stand  in  glory  on  the  last  Mantovano 
in  the  world." 


THE  OUTCRY 

It  was  a  presumption  his  friend  visibly  yearned  for 
— but  over  which,  too,  with  her  eyes  away  from  him, 
she  still  distinguished  the  shadow  of  a  cloud.  "That 
is  if  the  flash-light  comes!" 

"That  is  if  it  comes  indeed,  confound  it!" — he 
had  to  enlarge  a  little  under  the  recall  of  past  ex 
perience.  "So  now,  at  any  rate,  you  see  my  ten 
sion!" 

She  looked  at  him  again  as  with  a  vision  too  full 
for  a  waste  of  words.  "While  you  on  your  side  of 
course  keep  well  in  view  Mr.  Bender's." 

"Yes,  while  I  keep  well  in  view  Mr.  Bender's; 
though  he  doesn't  know,  you  see,  of  Bardi's  being  at 
hand." 

"Still,"  said  the  girl,  always  all  lucid  for  the  case, 
"if  the  'flash-light'  does  presently  break !" 

"It  will  first  take  him  in  the  eye?"  Hugh  had 
jumped  to  her  idea,  but  he  adopted  it  only  to  provide: 
"It  might  if  he  didn't  now  wear  goggles,  so  to  say!— 
clapped  on  him  too  hard  by  Pappendick's  so  damnably 
perverse  opinion."  With  which,  however,  he  quickly 
bethought  himself.  "Ah,  of  course,  these  wretched 
days,  you  haven't  known  of  Pappendick's  personal 
visit.  After  that  wire  from  Verona  I  wired  him  back 
defiance " 

"And  that  brought  him?"  she  cried. 

"To  do  the  honest  thing,  yes — I  will  say  for  him: 
194 


THE  OUTCRY 

to  renew,  for  full  assurance,  his  early  memory  of  our 
picture. " 

She  hung  upon  it.  "But  only  to  stick  then  to  what 
he  had  telegraphed  ?" 

"To  declare  that  for  him,  lackaday!  our  thing's  a 
pure  Moretto — and  to  declare  as  much,  moreover,  with 
all  the  weight  of  his  authority,  to  Bender  himself,  who 
of  course  made  a  point  of  seeing  him." 

"So  that  Bender" — she  followed  and  wondered — 
"is,  as  a  consequence,  wholly  off?" 

It  made  her  friend's  humour  play  up  in  his  acute- 
ness.  "Bender,  Lady  Grace,  is,  by  the  law  of  his  be 
ing,  never  ' wholly'  off — or  on! — anything.  He  lives, 
like  the  moon,  in  mid-air,  shedding  his  silver  light 
on  earth;  never  quite  gone,  yet  never  all  there — save 
for  inappreciable  moments.  He  would  be  in  eclipse 
as  a  peril,  I  grant,"  Hugh  went  on — "if  the  question 
had  struck  him  as  really  closed.  But  luckily  the 
blessed  Press — which  is  a  pure  heavenly  joy  and  now 
quite  immense  on  it — keeps  it  open  as  wide  as  Pic 
cadilly." 

"Which  makes,  however,"  Lady  Grace  discrimi 
nated,  "for  the  danger  of  a  grab." 

"Ah,  but  all  the  more  for  the  shame  of  a  surrender! 
Of  course  I  admit  that  when  it's  a  question  of  a  life 
spent,  like  his,  in  waiting,  acquisitively,  for  the  cat  to 
jump,  the  only  thing  for  one,  at  a  given  moment,  as 
against  that  signal,  is  to  be  found  one's  self  by  the 


THE  OUTCRY 

animal  in  the  line  of  its  trajectory.  That's  exactly," 
he  laughed,  "where  we  are!" 

She  cast  about  as  intelligently  to  note  the  place. 
"Your  great  idea,  you  mean,  has  so  worked — with  the 
uproar  truly  as  loud  as  it  has  seemed  to  come  to  us 
here?" 

"All  beyond  my  wildest  hope,"  Hugh  returned; 
"since  the  sight  of  the  picture,  flocked  to  every  day 
by  thousands,  so  beautifully  tells.  That  we  must  at 
any  cost  keep  it,  that  the  nation  must,  and  hang  on  to 
it  tight,  is  the  cry  that  fills  the  air — to  the  tune  of  ten 
letters  a  day  in  the  Papers,  with  every  three  days  a 
gorgeous  leader;  to  say  nothing  of  more  and  more 
passionate  talk  all  over  the  place,  some  of  it  awfully 
wild,  but  all  of  it  wind  in  our  sails." 

"  I  suppose  it  was  that  wind  then  that  blew  me  round 
there  to  see  the  thing  in  its  new  light,"  Lady  Grace 
said.  "  But  I  couldn't  stay — for  tears ! " 

"Ah,"  Hugh  insisted  on  his  side  for  comfort,  "we'll 
crow  loudest  yet!  And  don't  meanwhile,  just  don't, 
those  splendid  strange  eyes  of  the  fellow  seem  con 
sciously  to  plead?  The  women,  bless  them,  adore 
him,  cling  to  him,  and  there's  talk  of  a '  Ladies'  League 
of  Protest' — all  of  which  keeps  up  the  pitch." 

"Poor  Amy  and  I  are  a  ladies'  league,"  the  girl 
joylessly  joked — "as  we  now  take  in  the  c Journal' 
regardless  of  expense." 

"Oh  then  you  practically  have  it  all — since,"  Hugh 
196 


THE  OUTCRY 

added  after  a  brief  hesitation,  "  I  suppose  Lord  Theign 
himself  doesn't  languish  uninformed." 

"At  far-off  Salsomaggiore — by  the  papers?  No 
doubt  indeed  he  isn't  spared  even  the  worst,"  said 
Lady  Grace — "and  no  doubt  too  it's  a  drag  on  his 
cure." 

Her  companion  seemed  struck  with  her  lack  of  as 
surance.  "  Then  you  don't — if  I  may  ask — hear  from 
him?" 

"I?    Never  a  word." 

"He  doesn't  write?"  Hugh  allowed  himself  to  in 
sist. 

"He  doesn't  write.     And  I  don't  write  either." 

"And  Lady  Sandgate?"  Hugh  once  more  ven 
tured. 

"Doesn't  Rewrite?" 

"Doesn't  she  hear?"  said  the  young  man,  treating 
the  other  form  of  the  question  as  a  shade  evasive. 

"I've  asked  her  not  to  tell  me,"  his  friend  replied 
— "that  is  if  he  simply  holds  out." 

"So  that  as  she  doesn't  tell  you"— Hugh  was  clear 
for  the  inference — "he  of  course  does  hold  out."  To 
which  he  added  almost  accusingly  while  his  eyes 
searched  her:  "But  your  case  is  really  bad." 

She  confessed  to  it  after  a  moment,  but  as  if  vaguely 
enjoying  it.  "My  case  is  really  bad." 

He  had  a  vividness  of  impatience  and  contrition. 
197 


THE  OUTCRY 

"And  it's  I  who — all  too  blunderingly! — have  made  it 
so?" 

"I've  made  it  so  myself,"  she  said  with  a  high  head- 
shake,  "and  you,  on  the  contrary — !"  But  here  she 
checked  her  emphasis. 

"Ah,  I've  so  wanted,  through  our  horrid  silence,  to 
help  you!"  And  he  pressed  to  get  more  at  the  truth. 
"You've  so  quite  fatally  displeased  him?" 

"To  the  last  point— as  I  tell  you.  But  it's  not  to 
that  I  refer,"  she  explained;  "it's  to  the  ground  of 
complaint  I've  given  you."  And  then  as  this  but  left 
him  blank,  "It's  time — it  was  at  once  time — that  you 
should  know,"  she  pursued;  "and  yet  if  it's  hard  for 
me  to  speak,  as  you  see,  it  was  impossible  for  me  to 
write.  But  there  it  is."  She  made  her  sad  and  beauti 
ful  effort.  "The  last  thing  before  he  left  us  I  let  the 
picture  go." 

"You  mean — ?"  But  he  could  only  wonder — till, 
however,  it  glimmered  upon  him.  "  You  gave  up  your 
protest?" 

"  I  gave  up  my  protest.  I  told  him  that — so  far  as 
I'm  concerned! — he  might  do  as  he  liked." 

Her  poor  friend  turned  pale  at  the  sharp  little  shock 
of  it;  but  if  his  face  thus  showed  the  pang  of  too  great 
a  surprise  he  yet  wreathed  the  convulsion  in  a  gay 
grimace.  "  You  leave  me  to  struggle  alone  ?  " 

"I  leave  you  to  struggle  alone." 
198 


THE  OUTCRY 

He  took  it  in  bewilderingly,  but  tried  again,  even  to 
the  heroic,  for  optimism.  "Ah  well,  you  decided, 
I  suppose,  on  some  new  personal  ground." 

"Yes;  a  reason  came  up,  a  reason  I  hadn't  to  that 
extent  looked  for  and  which  of  a  sudden — quickly, 
before  he  went — I  had  somehow  to  deal  with.  So  to 
give  him  my  word  in  the  dismal  sense  I  mention  was 
my  only  way  to  meet  the  strain."  She  paused;  Hugh 
waited  for  something  further,  and  "I  gave  him  my 
word  I  wouldn't  help  you,"  she  wound  up. 

He  turned  it  over.     "To  act  in  the  matter — I  see." 

"To  act  in  the  matter" — she  went  through  with  it 
— "after  the  high  stand  I  had  taken." 

Still  he  studied  it.  "  I  see— I  see.  It's  between  you 
and  your  father." 

"It's  between  him  and  me — yes.  An  engagement 
not  again  to  trouble  him." 

Hugh,  from  his  face,  might  have  feared  a  still  greater 
complication;  so  he  made,  as  he  would  probably  have 
said,  a  jolly  lot  of  this.  "Ah,  that  was  nice  of  you. 
And  natural.  That's  all  right!" 

"No" — she  spoke  from  a  deeper  depth — "it's  al 
together  wrong.  For  whatever  happens  I  must  now 
accept  it." 

"Well,  say  you  must" — he  really  declined  not  to 
treat  it  almost  as  rather  a  "lark" — "if  we  can  at  least 
go  on  talking." 

199 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Ah,  we  can  at  least  go  on  talking!"  she  perversely 
sighed.  "I  can  say  anything  I  like  so  long  as  I  don't 
say  it  to  him!"  she  almost  wailed.  But  she  added 
with  more  firmness:  "I  can  still  hope — and  I  can  still 
pray." 

He  set  free  again  with  a  joyous  gesture  all  his  con 
fidence.  "  Well,  what  more  could  you  do,  anyhow  ? 
So  isn't  that  enough?" 

It  took  her  a  moment  to  say,  and  even  then  she 
didn't.  "Is  it  enough  for  you,  Mr.  Crimble?" 

"What  is  enough  for  me" — he  could  for  his  part 
readily  name  it — "is  the  harm  done  you  at  our  last 
meeting  by  my  irruption;  so  that  if  you  got  his  con 
sent  to  see  me !" 

"I  didn't  get  his  consent!" — she  had  turned  away 
from  the  searching  eyes,  but  she  faced  them  again 
to  rectify:  "I  see  you  against  his  express  com 
mand." 

"Ah  then  thank  God  I  came!"— it  was  like  a  bland 
breath  on  a  feu  de  joie:  he  flamed  so  much  higher. 

"Thank  God  you've  come,  yes — for  my  deplorable 
exposure."  And  to  justify  her  name  for  it  before  he 
could  protest,  "I  offered  him  here  not  to  see  you,"  she 
rigorously  explained. 

"'Offered  him?"— Hugh  did  drop  for  it.  "Not 
to  see  me — ever  again?" 

She  didn't  falter.     "Never  again." 
200 


THE  OUTCRY 

Ah  then  he  understood.  "  But  he  wouldn't  let  that 
serve ?" 

"Not  for  the  price  I  put  on  it." 

"His  yielding  on  the  picture?" 

"His  yielding  on  the  picture." 

Hugh  lingered  before  it  all.  "  Your  proposal  wasn't 
'good  enough'?" 

"It  wasn't  good  enough." 

"I  see,"  he  repeated— "I  see."  But  he  was  in  that 
light  again  mystified.  "Then  why  are  you  therefore 
not  free?" 

"Because — just  after — you  came  back,  and  I  did 
see  you  again!" 

Ah,  it  was  all  present.  "You  found  you  were  too 
sorry  for  me?" 

"I  found  I  was  too  sorry  for  you — as  he  himself 
found  I  was." 

Hugh  had  got  hold  of  it  now.  "  And  that,  you  mean, 
he  couldn't  stomach?" 

"  So  little  that  when  you  had  gone  (and  how  you  had 
to  go  you  remember)  he  at  once  proposed,  rather  than 
that  I  should  deceive  you  in  a  way  so  different  from 
his  own " 

"  To  do  all  we  want  of  him  ?  " 

"To  do  all  I  did  at  least." 

"And  it  was  then,"  he  took  in,  "that  you  wouldn't 
deal?" 

•      201 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Well" — try  though  she  might  to  keep  the  colour 
out,  it  all  came  straighter  and  straighter  now — "  those 
moments  had  brought  you  home  to  me  as  they  had 
also  brought  him;  making  such  a  difference,  I  felt, 
for  what  he  veered  round  to  agree  to." 

"The  difference" — Hugh  wanted  it  so  adorably 
definite — "that  you  didn't  see  your  way  to  accept- 
ing ?" 

"No,  not  to  accepting  the  condition  he  named." 

"Which  was  that  he'd  keep  the  picture  for  you  if 
you'd  treat  me  as  too  'low' ?" 

"If  I'd  treat  you,"  said  Lady  Grace  with  her  eyes 
on  his  fine  young  face,  "as  impossible." 

He  kept  her  eyes — he  clearly  liked  so  to  make  her 
repeat  it.  "And  not  even  for  the  sake  of  the  pic 
ture —  ?"  After  he  had  given  her  time,  however,  her 
silence,  with  her  beautiful  look  in  it,  seemed  to  admon 
ish  him  not  to  force  her  for  his  pleasure;  as  if  what  she 
had  already  told  him  didn't  make  him  throb  enough 
for  the  wonder  of  it.  He  had  it,  and  let  her  see  by  his 
high  flush  how  he  made  it  his  own — while,  the  next 
thing,  as  it  was  but  part  of  her  avowal,  the  rest  of  that 
illumination  called  for  a  different  intelligence.  "  Your 
father's  reprobation  of  me  personally  is  on  the  ground 
that  you're  all  such  great  people?" 

She  spared  him  the  invidious  answer  to  this  as,  a 
moment  before,  his  eagerness  had  spared  her  reserve; 

202 


THE  OUTCRY 

she  flung  over  the  "ground"  that  his  question  laid  bare 
the  light  veil  of  an  evasion.  " '  Great  people/  I've 
learned  to  see,  mustn't — to  remain  great — do  what 
my  father's  doing." 

"It's  indeed  on  the  theory  of  their  not  so  behaving," 
Hugh  returned,  "that  we  see  them — all  the  inferior 
rest  of  us — in  the  grand  glamour  of  their  greatness!" 

If  he  had  spoken  to  meet  her  admirable  frankness 
half-way,  that  beauty  in  her  almost  brushed  him  aside 
to  make  at  a  single  step  the  rest  of  the  journey.     "  You  .' 
won't  see  them  in  it  for  long — if  they  don't  now,  under 
such  tests  and  with  such  opportunities,  begin  to  take'  i 
care." 

This  had  given  him,  at  a  stroke,  he  clearly  felt,  all 
freedom  for  the  closer  criticism.  "Lord  Theign  per 
haps  recognises  some  such  canny  truth,  but  'takes 
care, '  with  the  least  trouble  to  himself  and  the  finest 
short  cut — does  it,  if  you'll  let  me  say  so,  rather  on  the 
cheap — by  finding  'the  likes'  of  me,  as  his  daughter's 
trusted  friend,  out  of  the  question." 

"  Well,  you  won't  mind  that,  will  you  ?  "  Lady  Grace 
asked,  "if  he  finds  his  daughter  herself,  in  any  such 
relation  to  you,  quite  as  much  so." 

"Different  enough,  from  position  to  position  and 
person  to  person,"  he  brightly  brooded,  "is  the  view 
that  gets  itself  most  comfortably  taken  of  the  implica 
tions  of  Honour!" 

203 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Yes,"  the  girl  returned;  "my  father,  in  the  act  of 
despoiling  us  all,  all  who  are  interested,  without  ap 
parently  the  least  unpleasant  consciousness,  keeps  the 
balance  showily  even,  to  his  mostly  so  fine,  so  delicate 
sense,  by  suddenly  discovering  that  he's  scandalised 
at  my  caring  for  your  friendship." 

Hugh  looked  at  her,  on  this,  as  with  the  gladness 
verily  of  possession  promised  and  only  waiting — or  as 
if  from  that  moment  forth  he  had  her  assurance  of 
everything  that  most  concerned  him  and  that  might 
most  inspire.  "Well,  isn't  the  moral  of  it  all  simply 
that  what  his  perversity  of  pride,  as  we  can  only  hold 
it,  will  have  most  done  for  us  is  to  bring  us — and  to 
keep  us — blessedly  together?" 

She  seemed  for  a  moment  to  question  his  "simply." 
" Do  you  regard  us  as  so  much  ' together'  when  you  re 
member  where,  in  spite  of  everything,  I've  put  my 
self?" 

"By  telling  him  to  do  what  he  likes?"  he  recalled 
without  embarrassment.  "Oh,  that  wasn't  in  spite 
of  '  everything' — it  was  only  in  spite  of  the  Manto- 
vano." 

"  'Only'?"  she  flushed — "when  I've  given  the  pic 
ture  up?" 

"Ah,"  Hugh  cried,  "I  don't  care  a  hang  for  the  pic 
ture!"  And  then  as  she  let  him,  closer,  close  to  her 
with  this,  possess  himself  of  her  hands:  "  We  both  only 

204 


THE  OUTCRY 

care,  don't  we,  that  we're  given  to  each  other  thus? 
We  both  only  care,  don't  we,  that  nothing  can  keep 
us  apart?" 

uOh,  if  you've  forgiven  me — !"  she  sighed  into  his 
fond  face. 

"  Why,  since  you  gave  the  thing  up  for  me,"  he 
pleadingly  laughed,  "it  isn't  as  if  you  had  given  me 
up !" 

"For  anything,  anything?  Ah  never,  never!"  she 
breathed. 

"Then  why  aren't  we  all  right?" 

"Well,  if  you  will !" 

"Oh  for  ever  and  ever  and  ever!" — and  with  this 
ardent  cry  of  his  devotion  his  arms  closed  in  their 
strength  and  she  was  clasped  to  his  breast  and  to  his 
lips. 

The  next  moment,  however,  she  had  checked  him 
with  the  warning  "Amy  Sandgate!" — as  if  she  had 
heard  their  hostess  enter  the  other  room.  Lady  Sand- 
gate  was  in  fact  almost  already  upon  them — their  dis 
junction  had  scarce  been  effected  and  she  had  reached 
the  nearer  threshold.  They  had  at  once  put  the  wid 
est  space  possible  between  them — a  little  of  the  flurry 
of  which  transaction  agitated  doubtless  their  clutch 
at  composure.  They  gave  back  a  shade  awkwardly 
and  consciously,  on  one  side  and  the  other,  the  specu 
lative  though  gracious  attention  she  for  a  few  moments 

205 


THE  OUTCRY 

made  them  and  their  recent  intimate  relation  the  sub 
ject  of;  from  all  of  which  indeed  Lady  Grace  sought 
and  found  cover  in  a  prompt  and  responsible  address  to 
Hugh.  "  Mustn't  you  go  without  more  delay  to  Clif 
ford  Street?" 

He  came  back  to  it  all  alert.  "At  once!"  He  had 
recovered  his  hat  and  reached  the  other  door,  whence 
he  gesticulated  farewell  to  the  elder  lady.  "Please 
pardon  me" — and  he  disappeared. 

Lady  Sandgate  hereupon  stood  for  a  little  silently 
confronted  with  the  girl.  "  Have  you  freedom  of  mind 
for  the  fact  that  your  father's  suddenly  at  hand?" 

"He  has  come  back?" — Lady  Grace  was  sharply 
struck. 

"  He  arrives  this  afternoon  and  appears  to  go  straight 
to  Kitty — according  to  a  wire  that  I  find  downstairs 
on  coming  back  late  from  my  luncheon.  He  has  re 
turned  with  a  rush — as,"  said  his  correspondent  in  the 
elation  of  triumph,  "I  was  sure  he  would!" 

Her  young  friend  was  more  at  sea.  "  Brought  back, 
you  mean,  by  the  outcry — even  though  he  so  hates  it?" 

But  she  was  more  and  more  all  lucidity — save  in  so 
far  as  she  was  now  almost  all  authority.  "Ah,  ha 
ting  still  more  to  seem  afraid,  he  has  come  back  to  face 
the  music!" 

Lady  Grace,  turning  away  as  in  vague  despair  for 
the  manner  in  which  the  music  might  affect  him,  yet 

206 


THE  OUTCRY 

wheeled  about  again,  after  thought,  to  a  positive  rec 
ognition  and  even  to  quite  an  inconsequent  pride. 
"Yes— that's  dear  old  father!" 

And  what  was  Lady  Sandgate  moreover  but  mistress 
now  of  the  subject  ?  "  At  the  point  the  row  has  reached 
he  couldn't  stand  it  another  day;  so  he  has  thrown 
up  his  cure  and — lest  we  should  oppose  him ! — not  even 
announced  his  start." 

"Well,"  her  companion  returned,  "now  that  I've 
done  it  all  I  shall  never  oppose  him  again!" 

Lady  Sandgate  appeared  to  show  herself  as  still 
under  the  impression  she  might  have  received  on  en 
tering.  "He'll  only  oppose  you!11 

"If  he  does,"  said  Lady  Grace,  "we're  at  present 
two  to  bear  it." 

"Heaven  save  us  then" — the  elder  woman  was 
quick,  was  even  cordial,  for  the  sense  of  this — "  your 
good  friend  is  clever!" 

Lady  Grace  honoured  the  remark.  "Mr.  Crim- 
ble's  remarkably  clever." 

"And  you've  arranged ?" 

"We  haven't  arranged — but  we've  understood.  So 
that,  dear  Amy,  if  you  understand — !"  Lady  Grace 
paused,  for  Gotch  had  come  in  from  the  hall. 

"His  lordship  has  arrived?"  his  mistress  imme 
diately  put  to  him. 

"No,  my  lady,  but  Lord  John  has — to  know  if  he's 
207 


THE  OUTCRY 

expected  here,  and  in  that  case,  by  your  ladyship's 
leave,  to  come  up." 

Her  ladyship  turned  to  the  girl.  "  May  Lord  John 
— as  we  do  await  your  father — come  up?" 

"As  suits  you,  please!" 

"  He  may  come  up,"  said  Lady  Sandgate  to  Gotch. 
"His  lordship's  expected."  She  had  a  pause  till  they 
were  alone  again,  when  she  went  on  to  her  companion: 
"You  asked  me  just  now  if  I  understood.  Well — 
I  do  understand!" 

Lady  Grace,  with  Gotch's  withdrawal,  which  left 
the  door  open,  had  reached  the  passage  to  the  other 
room.  "Then  you'll  excuse  me!" — she  made  her 
escape. 


II 


LORD  JOHN,  reannounced  the  next  instant  from  the 
nearest  quarter  and  quite  waiving  salutations,  left  no 
doubt  of  the  high  pitch  of  his  eagerness  and  tension  as 
soon  as  the  door  had  closed  behind  him.  "What  on 
earth  then  do  you  suppose  he  has  come  back  to  do — ?" 
To  which  he  added  while  his  hostess's  gesture  im 
patiently  disclaimed  conjecture:  "  Because  when  a  fel 
low  really  finds  himself  the  centre  of  a  cyclone !" 

"Isn't  it  just  at  the  centre,"  she  interrupted,  "that 
you  keep  remarkably  still,  and  only  in  the  suburbs  that 

208 


THE  OUTCRY 

you  feel  the  rage?    I  count  on  dear  Theign's  doing 
nothing  in  the  least  foolish !" 

"  Ah,  but  he  can't  have  chucked  everything  for  noth 
ing,"  Lord  John  sharply  returned;  "and  wherever 
you  place  him  in  the  rumpus  he  can't  not  meet  some 
how,  hang  it,  such  an  assault  on  his  character  as  a  great 
nobleman  and  good  citizen." 

"  It's  his  luck  to  have  become  with  the  public  of  the 
newspapers  the  scapegoat-in-chief:  for  the  sins,  so- 
called,  of  a  lot  of  people!"  Lady  Sandgate  inconclu 
sively  sighed. 

"Yes,"  Lord  John  concluded  for  her,  "the  mer 
cenary  millions  on  whose  traffic  in  their  trumpery 
values — when  they're  so  lucky  as  to  have  any! — this 
isn't  a  patch!" 

"Oh,  there  are  cases  and  cases:  situations  and  re 
sponsibilities  so  intensely  differ!" — that  appeared  on 
the  whole,  for  her  ladyship,  the  moral  to  be  gathered. 

"  Of  course  everything  differs,  all  round,  from  every 
thing,"  Lord  John  went  on;  "and  who  in  the  world 
knows  anything  of  his  own  case  but  the  victim  of  cir 
cumstances  exposing  himself,  for  the  highest  and  pur 
est  motives,  to  be  literally  torn  to  pieces?" 

"Well,"  said  Lady  Sandgate  as,  in  her  strained  sus 
pense,  she  freshly  consulted  her  bracelet  watch,  "I 
hope  he  isn't  already  torn — if  you  tell  me  you've  been 
to  Kitty's." 

209 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Oh,  he  was  all  right  so  far:  he  had  arrived  and 
gone  out  again,"  the  young  man  explained,  "as  Lady 
Imber  hadn't  been  at  home." 

"Ah  cool  Kitty!"  his  hostess  sighed  again — but  di 
verted,  as  she  spoke,  by  the  reappearance  of  her  but 
ler,  this  time  positively  preceding  Lord  Theign,  whom 
she  met,  when  he  presently  stood  before  her,  his  garb 
of  travel  exchanged  for  consummate  afternoon  dress, 
with  yearning  tenderness  and  compassionate  curiosity. 
"At  last,  dearest  friend — what  a  joy!  But  with  Kitty 
not  at  home  to  receive  you?" 

That  young  woman's  parent  made  light  of  it  for 
the  indulged  creature's  sake.  "Oh  I  knew  my  Kitty! 
I  dressed  and  I  find  her  at  five- thirty."  To  which  he 
added  as  he  only  took  in  further,  without  expression, 
Lord  John:  "But  Bender,  who  came  there  before 
my  arrival — he  hasn't  tried  for  me  here?" 

It  was  a  point  on  which  Lord  John  himself  could  at 
least  be  expressive.  "I  met  him  at  the  club  at  lunch 
eon;  he  had  had  your  letter — but  for  which  chance, 
my  dear  man,  I  should  have  known  nothing.  You'll 
see  him  all  right  at  this  house;  but  I'm  glad,  if  I  may 
say  so,  Theign,"  the  speaker  pursued  with  some  em 
phasis — "I'm  glad,  you  know,  to  get  hold  of  you  first." 

Lord  Theign  seemed  about  to  ask  for  the  meaning 
of  this  remark,  but  his  other  companion's  apprehen 
sion  had  already  overflowed.  "You  haven't  come 

210 


THE  OUTCRY 

back,  have  you — to  whatever  it  may  be! — for  trouble 
of  any  sort  with  Breckenridge?" 

His  lordship  transferred  his  penetration  to  this  fair 
friend.  "Have  you  become  so  intensely  absorbed — 
these  remarkable  days! — in  ' Breckenridge'?" 

She  felt  the  shadow,  you  would  have  seen,  of  his 
claimed  right,  or  at  least  privilege,  of  search — yet 
easily,  after  an  instant,  emerged  clear.  "I've  thought 
and  dreamt  but  of  you — suspicious  man! — in  propor 
tion  as  the  clamour  has  spread;  and  Mr.  Bender  mean 
while,  if  you  want  to  know,  hasn't  been  near  me  once!" 

Lord  John  came  in  a  manner,  and  however  uncon 
sciously,  to  her  aid.  "  You'd  have  seen,  if  he  had  been, 
what's  the  matter  with  him,  I  think — and  what  per 
haps  Theign  has  seen  from  his  own  letter:  since,"  he 
went  on  to  his  fellow- visitor,  "  I  understood  him  a  week 
ago  to  have  been  much  taken  up  with  writing  you." 

Lord  Theign  received  this  without  comment,  only 
again  with  an  air  of  expertly  sounding  the  speaker; 
after  which  he  gave  himself  afresh  for  a  moment  to 
Lady  Sandgate.  "I've  not  come  home  for  any  clam 
our,  as  you  surely  know  me  well  enough  to  believe;  or 
to  notice  for  a  minute  the  cheapest  insolence  and  ag 
gression — which  frankly  scarce  reached  me  out  there ; 
or  which,  so  far  as  it  did,  I  was  daily  washed  clean  of 
by  those  blest  waters.  I  returned  on  Mr.  Bender's 
letter,"  he  then  vouchsafed  to  Lord  John — "three  ex- 

211 


THE  OUTCRY 

traordinarily  vulgar  pages  about  the  egregious  Pap- 
pendick!" 

"  About  his  having  suddenly  turned  up  in  person, 
yes,  and,  as  Breckenridge  says,  marked  the  picture 
down?" — the  young  man  was  clearly  all-knowing. 
"That  has  of  course  weighed  on  Bender — being  con 
firmed  apparently,  on  the  whole,  by  the  drift  of  public 
opinion." 

Lord  Theign  took,  on  this,  with  a  frank  show  of  re 
action  from  some  of  his  friend's  terms,  a  sharp  turn 
off;  he  even  ironically  indicated  the  babbler  or  at  least 
the  blunderer  in  question  to  Lady  Sandgate.  "He 
too  has  known  me  so  long,  and  he  comes  here  to  talk 
to  me  of  'the  drift  of  public  opinion'!"  After  which 
he  quite  charged  at  his  vain  informant.  "  Am  I  to 
tell  you  again  that  I  snap  my  fingers  at  the  drift  of  pub 
lic  opinion  ? — which  is  but  another  name  for  the  chat- 
:  ter  of  all  the  fools  one  doesn't  know,  in  addition  to  all 
those  (and  plenty  of  'em!)  one  damnably  does." 

Lady  Sandgate,  by  a  turn  of  the  hand,  dropped  oil 
from  her  golden  cruse.  "  Ah,  you  did  that,  in  your  own 
grand  way,  before  you  went  abroad!" 

"I  don't  speak  of  the  matter,  my  dear  man,  in  the 
light  of  its  effect  on  you,11  Lord  John  importantly  ex 
plained — "but  in  the  light  of  its  effect  on  Bender;  who 
so  consumedly  wants  the  picture,  if  he  is  to  have  it, 
to  be  a  Mantovano,  but  seems  unable  to  get  it  taken 

212 


THE  OUTCRY 

at  last  for  anything  but  the  fine  old  Moretto  that  of 
course  it  has  always  been." 

Lord  Theign,  in  growing  disgust  at  the  whole 
beastly  complication,  betrayed  more  and  more  the  odd 
pitch  of  the  temper  that  had  abruptly  restored  him 
with  such  incalculable  weight  to  the  scene  of  action. 
"Well,  isn't  a  fine  old  Moretto  good  enough  for  him; 
confound  him?" 

It  pulled  up  not  a  little  Lord  John,  who  yet  made 
his  point.  "A  fine  old  Moretto,  you  know,  was  ex 
actly  what  he  declined  at  Dedborough — for  its  compar 
ative,  strictly  comparative,  insignificance;  and  he  only 
thought  of  the  picture  when  the  wind  began  to  rise  for 
the  enormous  rarity " 

"That  that  mendacious  young  cad  who  has  bam 
boozled  Grace,"  Lord  Theign  broke  in,  "  tried  to  be 
fool  us,  for  his  beggarly  reasons,  into  claiming  for  it?" 

Lady  Sandgate  renewed  her  mild  influence.  "Ah, 
the  knowing  people  haven't  had  their  last  word — the 
possible  Mantovano  isn't  exploded  yet!11 

Her  noble  friend,  however,  declined  the  offered 
spell.  "I've  had  enough  of  the  knowing  people — the 
knowing  people  are  serpents!  My  picture's  to  take  or 
to  leave — and  it's  what  I've  come  back,  if  you  please, 
John,  to  say  to  your  man  to  his  face." 

This  declaration  had  a  report  as  sharp  and  almost 
as  multiplied  as  the  successive  cracks  of  a  discharged 

213 


THE  OUTCRY 

revolver;  yet  when  the  light  smoke  cleared  Lady  Sand- 
gate  at  least  was  still  left  standing  and  smiling.  "  Yes, 
why  in  mercy's  name  can't  he  choose  which  ? — and  why 
does  he  write  him,  dreadful  Breckenridge,  such  tire 
some  argumentative  letters?" 

Lord  John  took  up  her  idea  as  with  the  air  of  some 
thing  that  had  been  working  in  him  rather  vehemently, 
though  under  due  caution  too,  as  a  consequence  of  this 
exchange,  during  which  he  had  apprehensively  watched 
his  elder.  "I  don't  think  I  quite  see  how,  my  dear 
Theign,  the  poor  chap's  letter  was  so  offensive." 

In  that  case  his  dear  Theign  could  tell  him.  "  Be 
cause  it  was  a  tissue  of  expressions  that  may  pass  cur 
rent — over  counters  and  in  awful  newspapers — in  his 
extraordinary  world  or  country,  but  that  I  decline  to 
take  time  to  puzzle  out  here." 

"If  he  didn't  make  himself  understood,"  Lord  John 
took  leave  to  laugh,  "  it  must  indeed  have  been  an  un 
usual  production  for  Bender." 

"  Oh,  I  often,  with  the  wild  beauty,  if  you  will,  of  so 
many  of  his  turns,  haven't  a  notion,"  Lady  Sandgate 
confessed  with  an  equal  gaiety,  "of  what  he's  talking 
about." 

"I  think  I  never  miss  his  weird  sense,"  her  younger 
guest  again  loyally  contended — "  and  in  fact  as  a  gen 
eral  thing  I  rather  like  it!" 

"I  happen  to  like  nothing  that  I  don't  enjoy,"  Lord 
214 


THE  OUTCRY 

Theign  rejoined  with  some  asperity — "  and  so  far  as  I 
do  follow  the  fellow  he  assumes  on  my  part  an  interest 
in  his  expenditure  of  purchase-money  that  I  neither  feel 
nor  pretend  to.  He  doesn't  want — by  what  I  spell  out 
— the  picture  he  refused  at  Dedborough;  he  may  pos 
sibly  want — if  one  reads  it  so — the  picture  on  view 
in  Bond  Street;  and  he  yet  appears  to  make,  with 
great  emphasis,  the  stupid  ambiguous  point  that  these 
two  'articles'  (the  greatest  of  Morettos  an  ' article'!) 
haven't  been  'by  now'  proved  different:  as  if  I  engaged 
with  him  that  I  myself  would  so  prove  them!" 

Lord  John  indulged  in  a  pause— but  also  in  a  sugges 
tion.  "He  must  allude  to  your  hoping — when  you  al 
lowed  us  to  place  the  picture  with  Mackintosh — that  it 
would  show  to  all  London  in  the  most  precious  light 
conceivable." 

"Well,  if  it  hasn't  so  shown"— and  Lord  Theign 
stared  as  if  mystified — "what  in  the  world's  the  mean 
ing  of  this  preposterous  racket?" 

"The  racket  is  largely,"  his  young  friend  explained, 
"the  vociferation  of  the  people  who  contradict  each 
other  about  it." 

On  which  their  hostess  sought  to  enliven  the  gravity 
of  the  question.  "  Some — yes — shouting  on  the  house 
tops  that's  a  Mantovano  of  the  Mantovanos,  and  others 
shrieking  back  at  them  that  they're  donkeys  if  not 
criminals." 

215 


THE  OUTCRY 

"He  may  take  it  for  whatever  he  likes,"  said  Lord 
Theign,  heedless  of  these  contributions,  "he  may 
father  it  on  Michael  Angelo  himself  if  he'll  but  clear 
out  with  it  and  let  me  alone! " 

"What  he'd  like  to  take  it  for,"  Lord  John  at  this 
point  saw  his  way  to  remark,  "  is  something  in  the  na 
ture  of  a  Hundred  Thousand." 

"A  Hundred  Thousand?"  cried  his  astonished 
friend. 

"Quite,  I  dare  say,  a  Hundred  Thousand" — the 
young  man  enjoyed  clearly  handling  even  by  the  lips 
so  round  a  sum. 

Lady  Sandgate  disclaimed  however  with  agility 
any  appearance  of  having  gaped.  "Why,  haven't 
you  yet  realised,  Theign,  that  those  are  the  American 
figures?" 

His  lordship  looked  at  her  fixedly  and  then  did  the 
same  by  Lord  John,  after  which  he  waited  a  little. 
"  I've  nothing  to  do  with  the  American  figures — which 
seem  to  me,  if  you  press  me,  you  know,  quite  intoler 
ably  vulgar." 

"  Well,  I'd  be  as  vulgar  as  anybody  for  a  Hundred 
Thousand!"  Lady  Sandgate  hastened  to  proclaim. 

"  Didn't  he  let  us  know  at  Dedborough,"  Lord  John 
asked  of  the  master  of  that  seat,  "that  he  had  no  use, 
as  he  said,  for  lower  values?" 

"I've  heard  him  remark  myself,"  said  their  com- 
216 


THE  OUTCRY 

panion,  rising  to  the  monstrous  memory,  "that  he 
wouldn't  take  a  cheap  picture — even  though  a  '  hand 
some'  one — as  a  present." 

"  And  does  he  call  the  thing  round  the  corner  a  cheap 
picture  ?"  the  proprietor  of  the  work  demanded. 

Lord  John  threw  up  his  arms  with  a  grin  of  impa 
tience.  "  All  he  wants  to  do,  don't  you  see  ?  is  to  pre 
vent  your  making  it  one!" 

Lord  Theign  glared  at  this  imputation  to  him  of  a 
low  ductility.  "I  offered  the  thing,  as  it  was,  at  an 
estimate  worthy  of  it — and  of  me." 

"My  dear  reckless  friend,"  his  young  adviser  pro 
tested,  "you  named  no  figure  at  all  when  it  came  to  the 
point !" 

"  It  didn't  come  to  the  point !  Nothing  came  to  the 
point  but  that  I  put  a  Moretto  on  view;  as  a  thing, 
yes,  perfectly" — Lord  Theign  accepted  the  reminding 
gesture — "on  which  a  rich  American  had  an  eye  and 
in  which  he  had,  so  to  speak,  an  interest.  That  was 
what  I  wanted,  and  so  we  left  it — parting  each  of  us 
ready  but  neither  of  us  bound." 

"Ah,  Mr.  Bender's  bound,  as  he'd  say,"  Lady  Sand- 
gate  interposed — "'bound'  to  make  you  swallow  the 
enormous  luscious  plum  that  your  appetite  so  morbidly 
rejects!" 

"My  appetite,  as  morbid  as  you  like" — her  old 
friend  had  shrewdly  turned  on  her — "  is  my  own  affair, 

217 


THE  OUTCRY 

and  if  the  fellow  must  deal  in  enormities  I  warn  him  to 
carry  them  elsewhere!" 

Lord  John,  plainly,  by  this  time,  was  quite  exasper 
ated  at  the  absurdity  of  him.  "  But  how  can't  you  see 
that  it's  only  a  plum,  as  she  says,  for  a  plum  and  an  eye 
for  an  eye — since  the  picture  itself,  with  this  huge  ven 
tilation,  is  now  quite  a  different  affair?" 

"How  the  deuce  a  different  affair  when  just  what 
the  man  himself  confesses  is  that,  in  spite  of  all  the 
chatter  of  the  prigs  and  pedants,  there's  no  really  estab 
lished  ground  for  treating  it  as'anything  but  the  same  ?  " 
On  which,  as  having  so  unanswerably  spoken,  Lord 
Theign  shook  himself  free  again,  in  his  high  petulance, 
and  moved  restlessly  to  where  the  passage  to  the  other 
room  appeared  to  offer  his  nerves  an  issue;  all  more 
over  to  the  effect  of  suggesting  to  us  that  something 
still  other  than  what  he  had  said  might  meanwhile  work 
in  him  behind  and  beneath  that  quantity.  The  specta 
tors  of  his  trouble  watched  him,  for  the  time,  in  uncer 
tainty  and  with  a  mute  but  associated  comment  on  the 
perversity  and  oddity  he  had  so  suddenly  developed; 
Lord  John  giving  a  shrug  of  almost  bored  despair  and 
Lady  Sandgate  signalling  caution  and  tact  for  their 
action  by  a  finger  flourished  to  her  lips,  and  in  fact  at 
once  proceeding  to  apply  these  arts.  The  subject  of 
her  attention  had  still  remained  as  in  worried  thought; 
he  had  even  mechanically  taken  up  a  book  from  a 

218 


THE  OUTCRY 

table — which  he  then,  after  an  absent  glance  at  it, 
tossed  down. 

"You're  so  detached  from  reality,  you  adorable 
dreamer,"  she  began — "and  unless  you  stick  to  that 
you  might  as  well  have  done  nothing.  What  you  call 
the  pedantry  and  priggishness  and  all  the  rest  of  it  is 
exactly  what  poor  Breckenridge  asked  almost  on  his 
knees,  wonderful  man,  to  be  allowed  to  pay  you  for; 
since  even  if  the  meddlers  and  chatterers  haven't 
settled  anything  for  those  who  know — though  which 
of  the  elect  themselves  after  all  does  seem  to  know  ? — 
it's  a  great  service  rendered  him  to  have  started  such  a 
hare  to  run!" 

Lord  John  took  freedom  to  throw  off  very  much  the 
same  idea.  "  Certainly  his  connection  with  the  whole 
question  and  agitation  makes  no  end  for  his  glory." 

It  didn't,  that  remark,  bring  their  friend  back  to  him, 
but  it  at  least  made  his  indifference  flash  with  derision. 
"  His  'glory'— Mr.  Bender's  glory  ?  Why,  they  quite  uni 
versally  loathe  him — judging  by  the  stuff  they  print!" 

"  Oh,  here — as  a  corrupter  of  our  morals  and  a  pro 
moter  of  our  decay,  even  though  so  many  are  flat  on 
their  faces  to  him — yes!     But  it's  another  affair  over  \ 
there  where  the  eagle  screams  like  a  thousand  steam-  ; 
whistles  and  the  newspapers  flap  like  the  leaves  of  the ; 
forest:   there  he'll  be,  if  you'll  only  let  him,  the  big 
gest  thing  going;    since  sound,  in  that  air,  seems  to 

219 


THE  OUTCRY 

mean  size,  and  size  to  be  all  that  counts.  If  he  said 
of  the  thing,  as  you  recognise,"  Lord  John  went  on, 
"'It's  going  to  be  a  Mantovano,'  why  you  can  bet 
your  life  that  it  is — that  it  has  got  to  be  some  kind  of 
a  one." 

His  fellow-guest,  at  this,  drew  nearer  again,  irri 
tated,  you  would  have  been  sure,  by  the  unconscious 
infelicity  of  the  pair — worked  up  to  something  quite 
openly  wilful  and  passionate.  "No  kind  of  a  furious 
flaunting  one,  under  my  patronage,  that  I  can  prevent, 
my  boy!  The  Dedborough  picture  in  the  market — 
owing  to  horrid  little  circumstances  that  regard  my 
self  alone — is  the  Dedborough  picture  at  a  decent, 
sufficient,  civilised  Dedborough  price,  and  nothing 
else  whatever;  which  I  beg  you  will  take  as  my  last 
word  on  the  subject." 

Lord  John,  trying  whether  he  could  take  it,  momen 
tarily  mingled  his  hushed  state  with  that  of  their  hos 
tess,  to  whom  he  addressed  a  helpless  look;  after  which, 
however,  he  appeared  to  find  that  he  could  only  reas 
sert  himself.  "  May  I  nevertheless  reply  that  I  think 
you'll  not  be  able  to  prevent  anything  ? — since  the  dis 
cussed  object  will  completely  escape  your  control  in 
New  York!" 

"And  almost  any  discussed  object" — Lady  Sand- 
gate  rose  to  the  occasion  also — "is  in  New  York,  by 
what  one  hears,  easily  worth  a  Hundred  Thousapd!" 

220 


THE  OUTCRY 

Lord  Theign  looked  from  one  of  them  to  the  other. 
"  I  sell  the  man  a  Hundred  Thousand  worth  of  swag 
ger  and  advertisement;  and  of  fraudulent  swagger  and 
objectionable  advertisement  at  that?" 

"  Well"— Lord  John  was  but  briefly  baffled—"  when 
the  picture's  his  you  can't  help  its  doing  what  it  can 
and  what  it  will  for  him  anywhere!" 

"Then  it  isn't  his  yet,"  the  elder  man  retorted — 
"and  I  promise  you  never  will  be  if  he  has  sent  you  to 
me  with  his  big  drum!" 

Lady  Sandgate  turned  sadly  on  this  to  her  associate 
in  patience,  as  if  the  case  were  now  really  beyond 
them.  "Yes,  how  indeed  can  it  ever  become  his  if 
Theign  simply  won't  let  him  pay  for  it?" 

Her  question  was  unanswerable.  "It's  the  first 
time  in  all  my  life  I've  known  a  man  feel  insulted,  in 
such  a  piece  of  business,  by  happening  not  to  be,  in  the 
usual  way,  more  or  less  swindled!" 

"Theign  is  unable  to  take  it  in,"  her  ladyship  ex 
plained,  "  that — as  I've  heard  it  said  of  all  these  money- 
monsters  of  the  new  type — Bender  simply  can't  af 
ford  not  to  be  cited  and  celebrated  as  the  biggest  buyer 
who  ever  lived." 

"Ah,  cited  and  celebrated  at  my  expense — say  it  at 
once  and  have  it  over,  that  I  may  enjoy  what  you  all 
want  to  do  to  me!" 

"The  dear  man's  inimitable — at  his  'expense'!"  It 
221 


THE  OUTCRY 

was  more  than  Lord  John  could  bear  as  he  fairly  flung 
himself  off  in  his  derisive  impotence  and  addressed  his 
wail  to  Lady  Sandgate. 

"Yes,  at  my  expense  is  exactly  what  I  mean," 
Lord  Theign  asseverated — uat  the  expense  of  my 
modest  claim  to  regulate  my  behaviour  by  my  own 
standards.  There  you  perfectly  are  about  the  man, 
and  it's  precisely  what  I  say — that  he's  to  hustle 
and  harry  me  because  he's  a  money-monster:  which 
I  never  for  a  moment  dreamed  of,  please  under 
stand,  when  I  let  you,  John,  thrust  him  at  me 
as  a  pecuniary  resource  at  Dedborough.  I  didn't 
put  my  property  on  view  that  he  might  blow  about 
it I" 

"No,  if  you  like  it,"  Lady  Sandgate  returned;  "but 
you  certainly  didn't  so  arrange" — she  seemed  to  think 
her  point  somehow  would  help — "that  you  might  blow 
about  it  yourself!" 

"Nobody  wants  to ' blow,'  "  Lord  John  more  stoutly 
interposed,  "either  hot  or  cold,  I  take  it;  but  I  really 
don't  see  the  harm  of  Bender's  liking  to  be  known  for 
the  scale  of  his  transactions — actual  or  merely  im 
puted  even,  if  you  will;  since  that  scale  is  really  so 
magnificent." 

Lady  Sandgate  half  accepted,  half  qualified  this 
plea.  "The  only  question  perhaps  is  why  he  doesn't 
try  for  some  precious  work  that  somebody — less  de- 

222 


THE  OUTCRY 

licious  than  dear  Theign — can  be  persuaded  on  bended 
knees  to  accept  a  hundred  thousand  for." 

"'Try'  for  one?" — her  younger  visitor  took  it  up 
while  her  elder  more  attentively  watched  him.  "  That 
was  exactly  what  he  did  try  for  when  he  pressed  you 
so  hard  in  vain  for  the  great  Sir  Joshua." 

"  Oh  well,  he  mustn't  come  back  to  that — must  he, 
Theign?"  her  ladyship  cooed. 

That  personage  failed  to  reply,  so  that  Lord  John 
went  on,  unconscious  apparently  of  the  still  more  sus 
picious  study  to  which  he  exposed  himself.  "  Besides 
which  there  are  no  things  of  that  magnitude  knocking 
about,  don't  you  know  ? — they've  got  to  be  worked  up 
first  if  they're  to  reach  the  grand  publicity  of  the  Fig 
ure!  Would  you  mind,"  he  continued  to  his  noble 
monitor,  "an  agreement  on  some  such  basis  as  this? 
— that  you  shall  resign  yourself  to  the  biggest  equiv 
alent  you'll  squeamishly  consent  to  take,  if  it's  at 
the  same  time  the  smallest  he'll  squeamishly  con 
sent  to  offer;  but  that,  that  done,  you  shall  leave  him 
free " 

Lady  Sandgate  took  it  up  straight,  rounding  it  off, 
as  their  companion  only  waited.  "Leave  him  free  to 
talk  about  the  sum  offered  and  the  sum  taken  as  prac 
tically  one  and  the  same?" 

"Ah,  you  know,"  Lord  John  discriminated,  "he 
doesn't  'talk'  so  much  himself — there's  really  nothing 

223 


THE  OUTCRY 

blatant  or  crude  about  poor  Bender.  It's  the  rate  at 
which — by  the  very  way  he's  'fixed':  an  awful  way 
indeed,  I  grant  you! — a  perfect  army  of  reporter- 
wretches,  close  at  his  heels,  are  always  talking  for 
him  and  of  him." 

Lord  Theign  spoke  hereupon  at  last  with  the  air 
as  of  an  impulse  that  had  been  slowly  gathering  force. 
"  You  talk  for  him,  my  dear  chap,  pretty  well.  You 
urge  his  case,  my  honour,  quite  as  if  you  were  assured 
of  a  commisssion  on  the  job — on  a  fine  ascending  scale ! 
Has  he  put  you  up  to  that  proposition,  eh?  Do  you 
get  a  handsome  percentage  and  are  you  to  make  a  good 
thing  of  it?" 

The  young  man  coloured  under  this  stinging  pleas 
antry — whether  from  a  good  conscience  affronted  or 
from  a  bad  one  made  worse;  but  he  otherwise  showed 
a  bold  front,  only  bending  his  eyes  a  moment  on  his 
watch.  "As  he's  to  come  to  you  himself — and  I 
don't  know  why  the  mischief  he  doesn't  come! — he 
will  answer  you  that  graceful  question." 

"Will  he  answer  it,"  Lord  Theign  asked,  "with  the 
veracity  that  the  suggestion  you've  just  made  on  his 
behalf  represents  him  as  so  beautifully  adhering  to?" 
On  which  he  again  quite  fiercely  turned  his  back 
recovered  his  detachment,  the  others  giving  way 
behind  him  to  a  blanker  dismay. 

Lord  John,  in  spite  of  this  however,  pumped  up  a 
224 


THE  OUTCRY 

tone.  "I  don't  see  why  you  should  speak  as  if  I  were 
urging  some  abomination." 

"Then  I'll  tell  you  why!"— and  Lord  Theign  was 
upon  him  again  for  the  purpose.  "Because  I  had 
rather  give  the  cursed  thing  away  outright  and  for  good 
and  all  than  that  it  should  hang  out  there  another  day 
in  the  interest  of  such  equivocations!" 

Lady  Sandgate's  dismay  yielded  to  her  wonder,  and 
her  wonder  apparently  in  turn  to  her  amusement. 
"  'Give  it  away,'  my  dear  friend,  to  a  man  who  only 
longs  to  smother  you  in  gold?" 

Her  dear  friend,  however,  had  lost  patience  with 
her  levity.  "  Give  it  away — just  for  a  luxury  of  pro 
test  and  a  stoppage  of  chatter — to  some  cause  as  un 
like  as  possible  that  of  Mr.  Bender's  power  of  sound 
and  his  splendid  reputation :  to  the  Public,  to  the  Au 
thorities,  to  the  Thingumbob,  to  the  Nation!" 

Lady  Sandgate  broke  into  horror  while  Lord  John 
stood  sombre  and  stupefied,  "  Ah,  my  dear  creature, 
you've  flights  of  extravagance !" 

"  One  thing's  very  certain,"  Lord  Theign  quite  heed 
lessly  pursued — "  that  the  thought  of  my  property  on 
view  there  does  give  intolerably  on  my  nerves,  more 
and  more  every  minute  that  I'm  conscious  of  it;  so 
that,  hang  it,  if  one  thinks  of  it,  why  shouldn't  I,  for 
my  relief,  do  again,  damme,  what  I  like  ? — that  is  bang 
the  door  in  their  faces,  have  the  show  immediately 

225 


THE  OUTCRY 

stopped  ?"  He  turned  with  the  attraction  of  this  idea 
from  one  of  his  listeners  to  the  other.  "It's  my  show 
— it  isn't  Bender's,  surely! — and  I  can  do  just  as  I 
choose  with  it." 

"Ah,  but  isn't  that  the  very  point?" — and  Lady 
Sandgate  put  it  to  Lord  John.  "Isn't  it  Bender's 
show  much  more  than  his?" 

Her  invoked  authority,  however,  in  answer  to  this, 
made  but  a  motion  of  disappointment  and  disgust  at 
so  much  rank  folly — while  Lord  Theign,  on  the  other 
hand,  followed  up  his  happy  thought.  "Then  if  it's 
Bender's  show,  or  if  he  claims  it  is,  there's  all  the  more 
reason!"  And  it  took  his  lordship's  inspiration  no 
longer  to  flower.  "  See  here,  John — do  this :  go  right 
round  there  this  moment,  please,  and  tell  them  from 
me  to  shut  straight  down!" 

"'Shut  straight  down'?"  the  young  man  abhor 
rently  echoed. 

"  Stop  it  to-night — wind  it  up  and  end  it :  see  ?  "  The 
more  the  entertainer  of  that  vision  held  it  there  the 
more  charm  it  clearly  took  on  for  him.  "Have  the 
picture  removed  from  view  and  the  incident  closed." 

"You  seriously  ask  that  of  me!"  poor  Lord  John 
quavered. 

"  Why  in  the  world  shouldn't  I  ?  It's  a  jolly  lot  less 
than  you  asked  of  me  a  month  ago  at  Dedborough." 

"  What  then  ami  to  say  to  them  ?  "  Lord  John  spoke 
226 


THE  OUTCRY 

but  after  a  long  moment,  during  which  he  had  only 
looked  hard  and — an  observer  might  even  then  have 
felt — ominously  at  his  taskmaster. 

That  personage  replied  as  if  wholly  to  have  done 
with  the  matter.  "  Say  anything  that  comes  into  your 
clever  head.  I  don't  really  see  that  there's  any 
thing  else  for  you!"  Lady  Sandgate  sighed  to  the 
messenger,  who  gave  no  sign  save  of  positive  stiffness. 

The  latter  seemed  still  to  weigh  his  displeasing  obli 
gation;  then  he  eyed  his  friend  significantly — almost 
portentously.  "Those  are  absolutely  your  senti 
ments?" 

"Those  are  absolutely  my  sentiments" — and  Lord 
Theign  brought  this  out  as  with  the  force  of  a  physi 
cal  push. 

"Very  well  then!"  But  the  young  man,  indulging 
in  a  final,  a  fairly  sinister,  study  of  such  a  dealer  in  the 
arbitrary,  made  sure  of  the  extent,  whatever  it  was,  of 
his  own  wrong.  "  Not  one  more  day  ?" 

Lord  Theign  only  waved  him  away.  "Not  one 
more  hour!" 

He  paused  at  the  door,  this  reluctant  spokesman,  as 
if  for  some  supreme  protest;  but  after  another  pro 
longed  and  decisive  engagement  with  the  two  pairs  of 
eyes  that  waited,  though  differently,  on  his  perform 
ance,  he  clapped  on  his  hat  as  in  the  rage  of  his  resent 
ment  and  departed  on  his  mission. 

227 


THE  OUTCRY 

III 

"HE  can't  bear  to  do  it,  poor  man!"  Lady  Sand- 
gate  ruefully  remarked  to  her  remaining  guest  after 
Lord  John  had,  under  extreme  pressure,  dashed  out 
to  Bond  Street. 

"I  dare  say  not!" — Lord  Theign,  flushed  with  the 
felicity  of  self-expression,  made  little  of  that.  "But 
he  goes  too  far,  you  see,  and  it  clears  the  air — pouah! 
Now  therefore" — and  he  glanced  at  the  clock — "I 
must  go  to  Kitty." 

"Kitty— with  what  Kitty  wants,"  Lady  Sandgate 
opined — "won't  thank  you  for  that  /" 

"She  never  thanks  me  for  anything" — and  the  fact 
of  his  resignation  clearly  added  here  to  his  bitter 
ness.  "So  it's  no  great  loss!" 

"Won't  you  at  any  rate,"  his  hostess  asked,  "wait 
for  Bender?" 

His  lordship  cast  it  to  the  winds.  "  What  have  I  to 
do  with  him  now?" 

"Why  surely  if  he'll  accept  your  own  price !" 

Lord  Theign  thought — he  wondered;  and  then  as 
if  fairly  amused  at  himself:  "Hanged  if  I  know  what 
is  my  own  price!"  After  which  he  went  for  his  hat. 
"But  there's  one  thing,"  he  remembered  as  he  came 
back  with  it:  "where's  my  too,  too  unnatural  daugh 
ter?" 

228 


THE  OUTCRY 

"If  you  mean  Grace  and  really  want  her  I'll  send 
and  find  out." 

"Not  now"— he  bethought  himself.  "But  does 
she  see  that  chatterbox?" 

"Mr.  Crimble?    Yes,  she  sees  him." 

He  kept  his  eyes  on  her.  "Then  how  far  has  it 
gone?" 

Lady  Sandgate  overcame  an  embarrassment.  "  Well, 
not  even  yet,  I  think,  so  far  as  they'd  like." 

"They'd  'like' — heaven  save  the  mark! — to  mar 
ry?" 

"I  suspect  them  of  it.  What  line,  if  it  should  come 
to  that,"  she  asked,  "would  you  then  take?" 

He  was  perfectly  prompt.  "The  line  that  for 
Grace  it's  simply  ignoble." 

The  force  of  her  deprecation  of  such  language  was 
qualified  by  tact.  "Ah,  darling,  as  dreadful  as  that?" 

He  could  but  view  the  possibility  with  dark  resent 
ment.  "It  lets  us  so  down — from  what  we've  always 
been  and  done;  so  down,  down,  down  that  I'm  amazed 
you  don't  feel  it!" 

"Oh,  I  feel  there's  still  plenty  to  keep  you  up!"  she 
soothingly  laughed. 

He  seemed  to  consider  this  vague  amount — which 
he  apparently  judged,  however,  not  so  vast  as  to  pro 
vide  for  the  whole  yearning  of  his  nature.  "Well, 
my  dear,"  he  thus  more  blandly  professed,  "I  shall 

229 


THE  OUTCRY 

need  all  the  extra  agrement  that  your  affection  can  still 
supply. " 

If  nothing  could  have  been,  on  this,  richer  than  her 
response,  nothing  could  at  the  same  time  have  been 
more  pleasing  than  her  modesty.  "Ah,  my  affection, 
Theign,  is,  as  I  think  you  know,  a  fountain  always  at 
flood;  but  in  any  more  worldly  element  than  that  I'm 
— as  you've  ever  seen  for  yourself — a  poor  struggler 
with  my  own  sad  affairs,  a  broken  reed;  not  a  bit 
'great,'  as  they  used  so  finely  to  call  it!  You  are  great 
— with  the  natural  sense  of  greatness  and,  for  your 
>  supreme  support,  the  instinctive  grand  manner  of 
doing  and  taking  things." 

He  sighed,  none  the  less,  he  groaned,  with  his  frown 
of  trouble,  for  the  strain  he  foresaw  on  these  resources. 
"If  you  mean  that  I  hold  up  my  head,  on  proper 
grounds,  I  grant  that  I  always  have.  But  how's  that 
longer  possible  when  my  children  commit  such  base 
vulgarities?  Why  in  the  name  of  goodness  have  I 
such  children?  What  the  devil  has  got  into  'em? — 
and  is  it  really  the  case  that  when  Grace  offers  me  for 
a  proof  of  her  license  and  a  specimen  of  her  taste  such 
a  son-in-law  as  you  tell  me  I'm  in  danger  of  I've  just 
helplessly  to  swallow  the  dose?" 

"  Do  you  find  Mr.  Crimble,"  Lady  Sandgate  asked 
as  if  there  might  really  be  something  to  say  for  him, 
"so  utterly  out  of  the  question?" 

230 


THE  OUTCRY 

"I  found  him  on  the  two  occasions  before  I  went 
away  in  the  last  degree  offensive  and  outrageous;  but 
even  if  he  charged  one  and  one's  poor  dear  decent  old 
defences  with  less  rabid  a  fury  everything  about  him 
would  forbid  that  kind  of  relation." 

What  kind  of  relation,  if  any,  Hugh's  deficiencies 
might  still  render  thinkable  Lord  Theign  was  kept 
from  going  on  to  mention  by  the  voice  of  Mr.  Gotch, 
who  had  thrown  open  the  door  to  the  not  altogether 
assured  sound  of  "Mr.  Breckenridge  Bender."  The 
guest  in  possession  gave  a  cry  of  impatience,  but  Lady 
Sandgate  said  "Coming  up?" 

"If  his  lordship  will  see  him." 

"Oh,  he's  beyond  his  time,"  his  lordship  pro 
nounced — "I  can't  see  him  now!" 

"Ah,  but  mustn't  you — and  mayn't  7  then?"  She 
waited,  however,  for  no  response  to  signify  to  her 
servant  "Let  him  come,"  and  her  companion  could 
but  exhale  a  groan  of  reluctant  accommodation  as 
if  he  wondered  at  the  point  she  made  of  it.  It  en 
lightened  him  indeed  perhaps  a  little  that  she  went  on 
while  Gotch  did  her  bidding.  "  Does  the  kind  of  re 
lation  you'd  be  condemned  to  with  Mr.  Crimble  let 
you  down,  down,  down,  as  you  say,  more  than  the 
relation  you've  been  having  with  Mr.  Bender?" 

Lord  Theign  had  for  it  the  most  uninforming  of 
stares.  "Do  you  mean  don't  I  hate  Jem  equally 
both?" 

231 


THE  OUTCRY 

She  cut  his  further  reply  short,  however,  by  a 
"Hush!"  of  warning — Mr.  Bender  was  there  and  his 
introducer  had  left  them. 

Lord  Theign,  full  of  his  purpose  of  departure,  sac 
rificed  hereupon  little  to  ceremony.  "I've  but  a  mo 
ment,  to  my  regret,  to  give  you,  Mr.  Bender,  and  if 
you've  been  unavoidably  detained,  as  you  great  bus 
tling  people  are  so  apt  to  be,  it  will  perhaps  still  be  soon 
enough  for  your  comfort  to  hear  from  me  that  I've  just 
given  order  to  close  our  exhibition.  From  the  pres 
ent  hour  on,  sir" — he  put  it  with  the  firmness  required 
to  settle  the  futility  of  an  appeal. 

Mr.  Bender's  large  surprise  lost  itself,  however, 
promptly  enough,  in  Mr.  Bender's  larger  ease.  "  Why, 
do  you  really  mean  it,  Lord  Theign? — removing  al 
ready  from  view  a  work  that  gives  innocent  gratifica- 
tign  to  thousands?" 

"Well,"  said  his  lordship  curtly,  "if  thousands  have 
seen  it  I've  done  what  I  wanted,  and  if  they've  been 
gratified  I'm  content — and  invite  you  to  be." 

Mr.  Bender  showed  more  keenness  for  this  richer 
implication.  "In  other  words  it's  I  who  may  remove 
the  picture?" 

"Well— if  you'll  take  it  on  my  estimate." 

"But  what,  Lord  Theign,  all  this  time,"  Mr.  Ben 
der  almost  pathetically  pleaded,  "is  your  estimate?" 

The  parting  guest  had  another  pause,  which  pro 
longed  itself,  after  he  had  reached  the  door,  in  a  deep 

232 


THE  OUTCRY 

solicitation  of  their  hostess's  conscious  eyes.  This 
brief  passage  apparently  inspired  his  answer.  "  Lady 
Sandgate  will  tell  you."  The  door  closed  behind 
him. 

The  charming  woman  smiled  then  at  her  other 
friend,  whose  comprehensive  presence  appeared  now 
to  demand  of  her  some  account  of  these  strange  pro 
ceedings.  "He  means  that  your  own  valuation  is 
much  too  shockingly  high." 

"  But  how  can  I  know  how  much  unless  I  find  out 
what  he'll  take?"  The  great  collector's  spirit  had, 
in  spite  of  its  volume,  clearly  not  reached  its  limit  of 
expansion.  "  Is  he  crazily  waiting  for  the  thing  to  be 
proved  not  what  Mr.  Crimble  claims?" 

"No,  he's  waiting  for  nothing — since  he  holds  that 
claim  demolished  by  Pappendick's  tremendous  nega 
tive,  which  you  wrote  to  tell  him  of." 

Vast,  undeveloped  and  suddenly  grave,  Mr.  Bender's 
countenance  showed  like  a  barren  tract  under  a  black 
cloud.  "I  wrote  to  report,  fair  and  square,  on  Pap- 
pendick,  but  to  tell  him  I'd  take  the  picture  just  the 
same,  negative  and  all." 

"Ah,  but  take  it  in  that  way  not  for  what  it  is  but 
for  what  it  isn't." 

"We  know  nothing  about  what  it '  isn't,'  "  said  Mr. 
Bender,  "after  all  that  has  happened — we've  only 
learned  a  little  better  every  day  what  it  is." 

233 


THE  OUTCRY 

"You  mean,"  his  companion  asked,  "the  biggest 
bone  of  artistic  contention ?" 

"Yes,"— he  took  it  from  her— "the  biggest  that  has 
been  thrown  into  the  arena  for  quite  a  while.  I  guess 
I  can  do  with  it  for  that" 

Lady  Sandgate,  on  this,  after  a  moment,  renewed  her 
personal  advance;  it  was  as  if  she  had  now  made  sure 
of  the  soundness  of  her  main  bridge.  "Well,  if  it's 
the  biggest  bone  I  won't  touch  it;  I'll  leave  it  to  be 
mauled  by  my  betters.  But  since  his  lordship  has 
asked  me  to  name  a  price,  dear  Mr.  Bender,  I'll  name 
one — and  as  you  prefer  big  prices  I'll  try  to  make  it 
suit  you.  Only  it  won't  be  for  the  portrait  of  a  per 
son  nobody  is  agreed  about.  The  whole  world  is 
agreed,  you  know,  about  my  great- grandmother." 

"Oh,  shucks,  Lady  Sandgate!" — and  her  visitor 
turned  from  her  with  the  hunch  of  overcharged  shoul 
ders. 

But  she  apparently  felt  that  she  held  him,  or  at  least 
that  even  if  such  a  conviction  might  be  fatuous  she 
must  now  put  it  to  the  touch.  "  You've  been  delivered 
into  my  hands — too  charmingly;  and  you  won't  really 
pretend  that  you  don't  recognise  that  and  in  fact  rather 
like  it." 

He  faced  about  to  her  again  as  to  a  case  of  coolness 
unparalleled — though  indeed  with  a  quick  lapse  of 
real  interest  in  the  question  of  whether  he  had  been 

234 


THE  OUTCRY 

artfully  practised  upon;  an  indifference  to  bad  debts 
or  peculation  like  that  of  some  huge  hotel  or  other  busi 
ness  involving  a  margin  for  waste.  He  could  afford, 
he  could  work  waste  too,  clearly — and  what  was  it, 
that  term,  you  might  have  felt  him  ask,  but  a  mean 
measure,  anyway?  quite  as  the  "artful,"  opposed  to 
his  larger  game,  would  be  the  hiding  and  pouncing  of 
children  at  play.  "Do  I  gather  that  those  uncanny 
words  of  his  were  just  meant  to  put  me  off?"  he  in 
quired.  And  then  as  she  but  boldly  and  smilingly 
shrugged,  repudiating  responsibility,  "Look  here, 
Lady  Sandgate,  ain't  you  honestly  going  to  help  me?" 
he  pursued. 

This  engaged  her  sincerity  without  affecting  her 
gaiety.  "Mr.  Bender,  Mr.  Bender,  I'll  help  you  if 
you'll  help  me!" 

"  You'll  really  get  me  something  from  him  to  go  on 
with?" 

"I'll  get  you  something  from  him  to  go  on  with." 

"That's  all  I  ask— to  get  that.  Then  I  can  move 
the  way  I  want.  But  without  it  I'm  held  up." 

"You  shall  have  it,"  she  replied,  "if  I  in  turn  may 
look  to  you  for  a  trifle  on  account." 

"Well,"  he  dryly  gloomed  at  her,  "what  do  you  call 
a  trifle?" 

"I  mean" — she  waited  but  an  instant — "what  you 
would  feel  as  one." 

235 


THE  OUTCRY 

"That  won't  do.  You  haven't  the  least  idea,  Lady 
Sandgate,"  he  earnestly  said,  "how  I  feel  at  these  fool 
ish  times.  I've  never  got  used  to  them  yet." 

"Ah,  don't  you  understand,"  she  pressed,  "that 
if  I  give  you  an  advantage  I'm  completely  at  your 
mercy  ?  " 

"Well,  what  mercy,"  he  groaned,  "do  you  de 
serve?" 

She  waited  a  little,  brightly  composed — then  she 
indicated  her  inner  shrine,  the  whereabouts  of  her 
precious  picture.  "Go  and  look  at  her  again  and 
you'll  see." 

His  protest  was  large,  but  so,  after  a  moment,  was 
his  compliance — his  heavy  advance  upon  the  other 
room,  from  just  within  the  doorway  of  which  the  great 
Lawrence  was  serenely  visible.  Mr.  Bender  gave  it 
his  eyes  once  more — though  after  the  fashion  verily  of 
a  man  for  whom  it  had  now  no  freshness  of  a  glamour, 
no  shade  of  a  secret;  then  he  came  back  to  his  hostess. 
"Do  you  call  giving  me  an  advantage  squeezing  me 
by  your  sweet  modesty  for  less  than  I  may  possibly 
bear?" 

"How  can  I  say  fairer,"  she  returned,  "than  that, 
with  my  backing  about  the  other  picture,  which  I've 
passed  you  my  word  for,  thrown  in,  I'll  resign  myself 
to  whatever  you  may  be  disposed — characteristically! 
— to  give  for  this  one." 

236 


THE  OUTCRY 

"If  it's  a  question  of  resignation,"  said  Mr.  Bender, 
"you  mean  of  course  what  I  may  be  disposed — char 
acteristically! — not  to  give." 

She  played  on  him  for  an  instant  all  her  radiance. 
"Yes  then,  you  dear  sharp  rich  thing!" 

"And  you  take  in,  I  assume,"  he  pursued,  "that 
I'm  just  going  to  lean  on  you,  for  what  I  want,  with  the 
full  weight  of  a  determined  man." 

"Well,"  she  laughed,  "I  promise  you  I'll  thoroughly 
obey  the  direction  of  your  pressure." 

"All  right  then!"  And  he  stopped  before  her,  in 
his  unrest,  monumentally  pledged,  yet  still  more  mass 
ively  immeasurable.  "How'll  you  have  it?" 

She  bristled  as  with  all  the  possible  beautiful  choices; 
then  she  shed  her  selection  as  a  heaving  fruit-tree  might 
have  dropped  some  round  ripeness.  It  was  for  her 
friend  to  pick  up  his  plum  and  his  privilege.  "Will 
you  write  a  cheque?" 

"Yes,  if  you  want  it  right  away."  To  which,  how 
ever,  he  added,  clapping  vainly  a  breast-pocket:  "  But 
my  cheque-book's  down  in  my  car." 

"At  the  door?"  She  scarce  required  his  assent  to 
touch  a  bell.  "I  can  easily  send  for  it."  And  she 
threw  off  while  they  waited:  "It's  so  sweet  your  ' fly 
ing  round'  with  your  cheque-book!" 

He  put  it  with  promptitude  another  way.  "It  flies 
round  pretty  well  with  me!" 

237 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Mr.  Bender's  cheque-book — in  his  car,"  she  went 
on  to  Gotch,  who  had  answered  her  summons. 

The  owner  of  the  interesting  object  further  in 
structed  him :  "  You'll  find  in  the  pocket  a  large  red 
morocco  case." 

"Very  good,  sir,"  said  Gotch — but  with  another 
word  for  his  mistress.  "Lord  John  would  like  to 
know " 

"Lord  John's  there?"   she  interrupted. 

Gotch  turned  to  the  open  door.  "Here  he  is,  my 
lady." 

She  accommodated  herself  at  once,  under  Mr.  Ben 
der's  eye,  to  the  complication  involved  in  his  lord 
ship's  presence.  "It's  he  who  went  round  to  Bond 
Street." 

Mr.  Bender  stared,  but  saw  the  connection.  "To 
stop  the  show  ?"  And  then  as  the  young  man  was  al 
ready  there:  "You've  stopped  the  show?" 

"It's  'on'  more  than  ever!"  Lord  John  responded 
while  Gotch  retired:  a  hurried,  flurried,  breathless 
Lord  John,  strikingly  different  from  the  backward 
messenger  she  had  lately  seen  despatched.  "But 
Theign  should  be  here!" — he  addressed  her  excitedly. 
"I  announce  you  a  call  from  the  Prince." 

"The  Prince?" — she  gasped  as  for  the  burden  of 
the  honour.  "He  follows  you?" 

Mr.  Bender,  with  an  eagerness  and  a  candour  there 
238 


THE  OUTCRY 

was  no  mistaking,  recognised  on  behalf  of  his  ampler 
action  a  world  of  associational  advantage  and  aus 
picious  possibility.  "Is  the  Prince  after  the  thing?" 

Lord  John  remained,  in  spite  of  this  challenge,  con 
scious  of  nothing  but  his  message.  "He  was  there 
with  Mackintosh — to  see  and  admire  the  picture; 
which  he  thinks,  by  the  way,  a  Mantovano  pure  and 
simple! — and  did  me  the  honour  to  remember  me. 
When  he  heard  me  report  to  Mackintosh  in  his  pres 
ence  the  sentiments  expressed  to  me  here  by  our  noble 
friend  and  of  which,  embarrassed  though  I  doubtless 
was,"  the  young  man  pursued  to  Lady  Sandgate,  "I 
gave  as  clear  an  account  as  I  could,  he  was  so  de 
lighted  with  it  that  he  declared  they  mustn't  think  then 
of  taking  the  thing  off,  but  must  on  the  contrary  keep 
putting  it  forward  for  all  it's  worth,  and  he  would 
come  round  and  congratulate  and  thank  Theign  and 
explain  him  his  reasons." 

Their  hostess  cast  about  for  a  sign.  "  Why  Theign 
is  at  Kitty's,  worse  luck!  The  Prince  calls  on  him 
here?" 

"He  calls,  you  see,  on  you,  my  lady — at  five-forty- 
five;  and  graciously  desired  me  so  to  put  it  you." 

"He's  very  kind,  but" — she  took  in  her  condition 
— "I'm  not  even  dressed!" 

"You'll  have  time" — the  young  man  was  a  com 
fort — "  while  I  rush  to  Berkeley  Square.  And  pardon 

239 


THE  OUTCRY 

me,  Bender — though  it's  so  near — if  I  just  bag  your 
car." 

"That's,  that's  it,  take  his  car!"— Lady  Sandgate 
almost  swept  him  away. 

"You  may  use  my  car  all  right,"  Mr.  Bender  con 
tributed — "  but  what  I  want  to  know  is  what  the  man's 
after." 

"The  man?  what  man?"  his  friend  scarce  paused 
to  ask. 

"The  Prince  then — if  you  allow  he  is  a  man!  Is 
he  after  my  picture?" 

Lord  John  vividly  disclaimed  authority.  "  If  you'll 
wait,  my  dear  fellow,  you'll  see." 

"Oh  why  should  he  'wait1?"  burst  from  their 
cautious  companion — only  to  be  caught  up,  however, 
in  the  next  breath,  so  swift  her  gracious  revolution. 
"Wait,  wait  indeed,  Mr.  Bender — I  won't  give  you 
up  for  any  Prince!"  With  which  she  appealed  again 
to  Lord  John.  "He  wants  to  'congratulate'?" 

"On  Theign's  decision,  as  I've  told  you — which  I 
announced  to  Mackintosh,  by  Theign's  extraordi 
nary  order,  under  his  Highness's  nose,  and  which  his 
Highness,  by  the  same  token,  took  up  like  a  shot." 

Her  face,  as  she  bethought  herself,  was  convulsed 
as  by  some  quick  perception  of  what  her  informant 
must  have  done  and  what  therefore  the  Prince's  in 
terest  rested  on;  all,  however,  to  the  effect,  given  their 

240 


THE  OUTCRY 

actual  company,  of  her  at  once  dodging  and  covering 
that  issue.  "The  decision  to  remove  the  picture ?" 

Lord  John  also  observed  a  discretion.  "He 
wouldn't  hear  of  such  a  thing — says  it  must  stay  stock 
still.  So  there  you  are!" 

This  determined  in  Mr.  Bender  a  not  unnatural, 
in  fact  quite  a  clamorous,  series  of  questions.  "But 
where  are  we,  and  what  has  the  Prince  to  do  with  Lord 
Theign's  decision  when  that's  all  Pm  here  for  ?  What 
in  thunder  is  Lord  Theign's  decision — what  was  his 
'  extraordinary  order '  ?  " 

Lord  John,  too  long  detained  and  his  hand  now  on 
the  door,  put  off  this  solicitor  as  he  had  already  been 
put  off.  "Lady  Sandgate,  you  tell  him!  I  rush!" 

Mr.  Bender  saw  him  vanish,  but  all  to  a  greater 

bewilderment.  "What  the  h then  (I  beg  your 

pardon!)  is  he  talking  about,  and  what  ' sentiments' 
did  he  report  round  there  that  Lord  Theign  had  been 
expressing?" 

His  hostess  faced  it  not  otherwise  than  if  she  had 
resolved  not  to  recognise  the  subject  of  his  curiosity 
— for  fear  of  other  recognitions.  "They  put  every 
thing  on  me,  my  dear  man — but  I  haven't  the  least 
idea." 

He  looked  at  her  askance.  "Then  why  does  the 
fellow  say  you  have?" 

Much  at  a  loss  for  the  moment,  she  yet  found  her 
241 


THE  OUTCRY 

way.  "Because  the  fellow's  so  agog  that  he  doesn't 
know  what  he  says ! "  In  addition  to  which  she  was  re 
lieved  by  the  reappearance  of  Gotch,  who  bore  on  a 
salver  the  object  he  had  been  sent  for  and  to  which 
he  duly  called  attention. 

"The  large  red  morocco  case." 

Lady  Sandgate  fairly  jumped  at  it.  "  Your  blessed 
cheque-book.  Lay  it  on  my  desk,"  she  said  to  Gotch, 
though  waiting  till  he  had  departed  again  before  she 
resumed  to  her  visitor:  "Mightn't  we  conclude  before 
he  comes?" 

"The  Prince?"  Mr.  Bender's  imagination  had 
strayed  from  the  ground  to  which  she  sought  to  lead 
it  back,  and  it  but  vaguely  retraced  its  steps.  "Will 
he  want  your  great-grandmother?" 

"Well,  he  may  when  he  sees  her!"  Lady  Sandgate 
laughed.  "And  Theign,  when  he  comes,  will  give 
you  on  his  own  question,  I  feel  sure,  every  information. 
Shall  I  fish  it  out  for  you?"  she  encouragingly  asked, 
beside  him  by  her  secretary-desk,  at  which  he  had 
arrived  under  her  persuasive  guidance  and  where  she 
sought  solidly  to  establish  him,  opening  out  the  gilded 
crimson  case  for  his  employ,  so  that  he  had  but  to 
help  himself.  "What  enormous  cheques!  You  can 
never  draw  one  for  two-pound-ten!" 

"That's  exactly  what  you  deserve  I  should  do!" 
He  remained  after  this  solemnly  still,  however,  like 

242 


THE  OUTCRY 

some  high-priest  circled  with  ceremonies;  in  conso 
nance  with  which,  the  next  moment,  both  her  hands 
held  out  to  him  the  open  and  immaculate  page  of  the 
oblong  series  much  as  they  might  have  presented  a 
royal  infant  at  the  christening- font. 

He  failed,  in  his  preoccupation,  to  receive  it;  so  she 
placed  it  before  him  on  the  table,  coming  away  with  a 
brave  gay  "Well,  I  leave  it  to  you!"  She  had  not, 
restlessly  revolving,  kept  her  discreet  distance  for  many 
minutes  before  she  found  herself  almost  face  to  face 
with  the  recurrent  Gotch,  upright  at  the  door  with  a 
fresh  announcement. 

"Mr.  Crimble,  please — for  Lady  Grace." 

"Mr.  Crimble  again?" — she  took  it  discomposedly. 

It  reached  Mr.  Bender  at  the  secretary,  but  to  a 
different  effect.  "Mr.  Crimble?  Why  he's  just  the 
man  I  want  to  see!" 

Gotch,  turning  to  the  lobby,  had  only  to  make  way 
for  him.  "Here  he  is,  my  lady." 

"Then  tell  her  ladyship." 

"She  has  come  down,"  said  Gotch  while  Hugh  ar 
rived  and  his  companion  withdrew,  and  while  Lady 
Grace,  reaching  the  scene  from  the  other  quarter, 
emerged  in  bright  equipment — in  her  hat,  scarf  and 
gloves. 


243 


THE  OUTCRY 


IV 


THESE  young  persons  were  thus  at  once  confronted 
across  the  room,  and  the  girl  explained  her  prepara 
tion.  "  I  was  listening  hard — for  your  knock  and  your 
voice." 

"Then  know  that,  thank  God,  it's  all  right!"— 
Hugh  was  breathless,  jubilant,  radiant. 

"A  Mantovano?"    she  delightedly  cried. 

"A  Mantovano!"  he  proudly  gave  back. 

"A  Mantovano!" — it  carried  even  Lady  Sandgate 
away. 

"A  Mantovano — a  sure  thing?"  Mr.  Bender 
jumped  up  from  his  business,  all  gaping  attention  to 
Hugh. 

"I've  just  left  our  blest  Bardi,"  said  that  young  man 
— "who  hasn't  the  shadow  of  a  doubt  and  is  delighted 
to  publish  it  everywhere." 

"  Will  he  publish  it  right  here  to  me  ?"  Mr.  Bender 
hungrily  asked. 

"Well,"  Hugh  smiled,  "you  can  try  him." 

"But  try  him  how,  where?"  The  great  collector, 
straining  to  instant  action,  cast  about  for  his  hat. 
" Where  is  he,  hey?" 

"Don't  you  wish  I'd  tell  you?"  Hugh,  in  his  per 
sonal  elation,  almost  cynically  answered. 

244 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Won't  you  wait  for  the  Prince?"  Lady  Sandgate 
had  meanwhile  asked  of  her  friend;  but  had  turned 
more  inspectingly  to  Lady  Grace  before  he  could  reply. 
"My  dear  child — though  you're  lovely! — are  you  sure 
you're  ready  for  him?" 

"For  the  Prince!" — the  girl  was  vague.  "Is  he 
coming?" 

"At  five-forty-five."  With  which  she  consulted  her 
bracelet  watch,  but  only  at  once  to  wail  for  alarm. 
"Ah,  it  is  that,  and  I'm  not  dressed!"  She  hurried  off 
through  the  other  room. 

Mr.  Bender,  quite  accepting  her  retreat,  addressed 
himself  again  unabashed  to  Hugh:  "It's  your  blest 
Bardi  I  want  first— I'll  take  the  Prince  after." 

The  young  man  clearly  could  afford  indulgence 
now.  "  Then  I  left  him  at  Long's  Hotel." 

"Why,  right  near!  I'll  come  back."  And  Mr. 
Bender's  flight  was  on  the  wings  of  optimism. 

But  it  all  gave  Hugh  a  quick  question  for  Lady 
Grace.  "  Why  does  the  Prince  come,  and  what  in  the 
world's  happening?" 

"  My  father  has  suddenly  returned — it  may  have  to 
do  with  that." 

The  shadow  of  his  surprise  darkened  visibly  to  that 
of  his  fear.  "Mayn't  it  be  more  than  anything  else 
to  give  you  and  me  his  final  curse?" 

"I  don't  know — and  I  think  I  don't  care.  I  don't 
245 


THE  OUTCRY 

care,"  she  said,  "so  long  as  you're  right  and  as  the 
greatest  light  of  all  declares  you  are." 

"He  is  the  greatest" — Hugh  was  vividly  of  that 
opinion  now:  "I  could  see  it  as  soon  as  I  got  there 
with  him,  the  charming  creature!  There,  before  the 
holy  thing,  and  with  the  place,  by  good  luck,  for  those 
great  moments,  practically  to  ourselves — without  Mac 
intosh  to  take  in  what  was  happening  or  any  one  else 
at  all  to  speak  of — it  was  but  a  matter  of  ten  minutes : 
he  had  come,  he  had  seen,  and  7  had  conquered." 

"Naturally  you  had!" — the  girl  hung  on  him  for 
it;  "and  what  was  happening  beyond  everything 
else  was  that  for  your  original  dear  divination,  one 
of  the  divinations  of  genius — with  every  creature  all 
these  ages  so  stupid — you  were  being  baptized  on  the 
spot  a  great  man." 

"  Well,  he  did  let  poor  Pappendick  have  it  at  least — 
he  doesn't  think  he's  one:  that  that  eminent  judge 
couldn't,  even  with  such  a  leg  up,  rise  to  my  level  or 
seize  my  point.  And  if  you  really  want  to  know," 
Hugh  went  on  in  his  gladness,  "  what  for  us  has  most 
particularly  and  preciously  taken  place,  it  is  that  in 
his  opinion,  for  my  career " 

"Your  reputation,"  she  cried,  "blazes  out  and  your 
fortune's  made?" 

He  did  a  happy  violence  to  his  modesty.  "Well, 
Bardi  adores  intelligence  and  takes  off  his  hat  to  me." 

246 


THE  OUTCRY 

"Then  you  need  take  off  yours  to  nobody!" — such 
was  Lady  Grace's  proud  opinion.  "  But  I  should  like 
to  take  off  mine  to  him"  she  added;  "which  I  seem 
to  have  put  on — to  get  out  and  away  with  you — ex 
pressly  for  that." 

Hugh,  as  he  looked  her  over,  took  it  up  in  bliss. 
"Ah,  we'll  go  forth  together  to  him  then — thanks  to 
your  happy,  splendid  impulse! — and  you'll  back  him 
gorgeously  up  in  the  good  he  thinks  of  me." 

His  friend  yet  had  on  this  a  sombre  second  thought. 
"The  only  thing  is  that  our  awful  American !" 

But  he  warned  her  with  a  raised  hand.  "Not  to 
speak  of  our  awful  Briton!" 

For  the  door  had  opened  from  the  lobby,  admitting 
Lord  Theign,  unattended,  who,  at  sight  of  his 
daughter  and  her  companion,  pulled  up  and  held 
them  a  minute  in  reprehensive  view — all  at  least  till 
Hugh  undauntedly,  indeed  quite  cheerfully,  greeted 
him. 

"Since  you  find  me  again  in  your  path,  my  lord, 
it's  because  I've  a  small,  but  precious  document  to 
deliver  you,  if  you'll  allow  me  to  do  so;  which  I  feel  it 
important  myself  to  place  in  your  h'and."  He  drew 
from  his  breast  a  pocket-book  and  extracted  thence  a 
small  unsealed  envelope;  retaining  the  latter  a  trifle 
helplessly  in  his  hand  while  Lord  Theign  only  opposed 
to  this  demonstration  an  unmitigated  blankness.  He 

247 


THE  OUTCRY 

went  none  the  less  br  vely  on.  "I  mentioned  to  you 
the  last  time  we  somewhat  infelicitously  met  that  I 
intended  to  appeal  to  another  and  probably  more 
closely  qualified  artistic  authority  on  the  subject  of 
your  so-called  Moretto;  and  I  in  fact  saw  the  pic 
ture  half  an  hour  ago  with  Bardi  of  Milan,  who,  there 
in  presence  of  it,  did  absolute,  did  ideal  justice,  as  I 
had  hoped,  to  the  claim  I've  been  making.  I  then 
went  with  him  to  his  hotel,  close  at  hand,  where  he 
dashed  me  off  this  brief  and  rapid,  but  quite  conclu 
sive,  Declaration,  which,  if  you'll  be  so  good  as  to 
read  it,  will  enable  you  perhaps  to  join  us  in  regard 
ing  the  vexed  question  as  settled." 

His  lordship,  having  faced  this  speech  without  a 
sign,  rested  on  the  speaker  a  somewhat  more  con 
fessed  intelligence,  then  looked  hard  at  the  offered 
note  and  hard  at  the  floor — all  to  avert  himself  ac 
tively  afterward  and,  with  his  head  a  good  deal  ele 
vated,  add  to  his  distance,  as  it  were,  from  every  one 
and  everything  so  indelicately  thrust  on  his  attention. 
This  movement  had  an  ambiguous  makeshift  air,  yet 
his  companions,  under  the  impression  of  it,  exchanged 
a  hopeless  look.  His  daughter  none  the  less  lifted 
her  voice.  "If  you  won't  take  what  he  has  for  you 
from  Mr.  Crimble,  father,  will  you  take  it  from 
me?"  And  then  as  after  some  apparent  debate  he 
appeared  to  decide  to  heed  her,  "It  may  be  so  long 

248 


THE  OUTCRY 

again,"  she  said,  "before  you've  a  chance  to  do  a 
thing  I  ask." 

"The  chance  will  depend  on  yourself!"  he  returned 
with  high  dry  emphasis.  But  he  held  out  his  hand 
for  the  note  Hugh  had  given  her  and  with  which  she 
approached  him;  and  though  face  to  face  they  seemed 
more  separated  than  brought  near  by  this  contact 
without  commerce.  She  turned  away  on  one  side 
when  he  had  taken  the  missive,  as  Hugh  had  turned 
away  on  the  other;  Lord  Theign  drew  forth  the  con 
tents  of  the  envelope  and  broodingly  and  inexpres 
sively  read  the  few  lines;  after  which,  as  having  done 
justice  to  their  sense,  he  thrust  the  paper  forth  again 
till  his  daughter  became  aware  and  received  it.  She 
restored  it  to  her  friend  while  her  father  dandled  off 
anew,  but  coming  round  this  time,  almost  as  by  a  cir 
cuit  of  the  room,  and  meeting  Hugh,  who  took  ad 
vantage  of  it  to  repeat  by  a  frank  gesture  his  offer 
of  Bardi's  attestation.  Lord  Theign  passed  with  the 
young  man  on  this  a  couple  of  mute  minutes  of  the 
same  order  as  those  he  had  passed  with  Lady  Grace 
in  the  same  connection;  their  eyes  dealt  deeply  with 
their  eyes — but  to  the  effect  of  his  lordship's  accepting 
the  gift,  which  after  another  minute  he  had  slipped 
into  his  breast-pocket.  It  was  not  till  then  that  he 
brought  out  a  curt  but  resonant  "Thank  you!" 
While  the  others  awaited  his  further  pleasure  he  again 

249 


THE  OUTCRY 

bethought  himself — then  he  addressed  Lady  Grace. 
"I  must  let  Mr.  Bender  know " 

"Mr.  Bender,"  Hugh  interposed,  "does  know. 
He's  at  the  present  moment  with  the  author  of  that 
note  at  Long's  Hotel." 

"Then  I  must  now  write  him" — and  his  lordship, 
while  he  spoke  and  from  where  he  stood,  looked  in 
refined  disconnectedness  out  of  the  window. 

"Will  you  write  there?" — and  his  daughter  indi 
cated  Lady  Sandgate's  desk,  at  which  we  have  seen 
Mr.  Bender  so  importantly  seated. 

Lord  Theign  had  a  start  at  her  again  speaking  to 
him;  but  he  bent  his  view  on  the  convenience  awaiting 
him  and  then,  as  to  have  done  with  so  tiresome  a 
matter,  took  advantage  of  it.  He  went  and  placed 
himself,  and  had  reached  for  paper  and  a  pen  when, 
struck  apparently  with  the  display  of  some  incon 
gruous  object,  he  uttered  a  sharp  "Hallo!" 

"You  don't  find  things?"  Lady  Grace  asked — as 
remote  from  him  in  one  quarter  of  the  room  as  Hugh 
was  in  another. 

"On  the  contrary!"  he  oddly  replied.  But  plainly 
suppressing  any  further  surprise  he  committed  a  few 
words  to  paper  and  put  them  into  an  envelope,  which 
he  addressed  and  brought  away. 

"If  you  like,"  said  Hugh  urbanely,  "I'll  carry  him 
that  myself." 

250 


THE  OUTCRY 

"But  how  do  you  know  what  it  consists  of?" 

"I  don't  know.     But  I  risk  it." 

His  lordship  weighed  the  proposition  in  a  high  im 
personal  manner — he  even  nervously  weighed  his 
letter,  shaking  it  with  one  hand  upon  the  finger-tips 
of  the  other;  after  which,  as  finally  to  acquit  himself 
of  any  measurable  obligation,  he  allowed  Hugh,  by  a 
surrender  of  the  interesting  object,  to  redeem  his  offer 
of  service.  "Then  you'll  learn,"  he  simply  said. 

"And  may  /  learn?"  asked  Lady  Grace. 

"You?"  The  tone  made  so  light  of  her  that  it  was 
barely  interrogative. 

"May  I  go  with  him?" 

Her  father  looked  at  the  question  as  at  some  cup 
of  supreme  bitterness — a  nasty  and  now  quite  regular 
dose  with  which  his  lips  were  familiar,  but  before 
which  their  first  movement  was  always  tightly  to  close. 
"With  me,  my  lord,"  said  Hugh  at  last,  thoroughly 
determined  they  should  open  and  intensifying  the 
emphasis. 

He  had  his  effect,  and  Lord  Theign's  answer,  ad 
dressed  to  Lady  Grace,  made  indifference  very  com 
prehensive.  "You  may  do  what  ever  you  dreadfully 
like!" 

At  this  then  the  girl,  with  an  air  that  seemed  to 
present  her  choice  as  absolutely  taken,  reached  the 
door  which  Hugh  had  come  across  to  open  for  her. 


THE  OUTCRY 

Here  she  paused  as  for  another,  a  last  look  at  her 
father,  and  her  expression  seemed  to  say  to  him  im- 
aidedly  that,  much  as  she  would  have  preferred  to 
proceed  to  her  act  without  this  gross  disorder,  she 
could  yet  find  inspiration  too  in  the  very  difficulty 
and  the  old  faiths  themselves  that  he  left  her  to 
struggle  with.  All  this  made  for  depth  and  beauty 
in  her  serious  young  face — as  it  had  indeed  a  force 
that,  not  indistinguishably,  after  an  instant,  his  lord 
ship  lost  any  wish  for  longer  exposure  to.  His  shift 
of  his  attitude  before  she  went  out  was  fairly 
an  evasion;  if  the  extent  of  the  levity  of  one  of  his 
daughter's  made  him  afraid,  what  might  have  been 
his  present  strange  sense  but  a  fear  of  the  other  from 
the  extent  of  her  gravity?  Lady  Grace  passes  from 
us  at  any  rate  in  her  laced  and  pearled  and  plumed 
slimness  and  her  pale  concentration — leaving  her 
friend  a  moment,  however,  with  his  hand  on  the 
door. 

"You  thanked  me  just  now  for  Bardi's  opinion 
after  all,"  Hugh  said  with  a  smile;  "and  it  seems  to 
me  that — after  all  as  well — I've  grounds  for  thanking 
you!"  On  which  he  left  his  benefactor  alone. 

"Tit  for  tat!"  There  broke  from  Lord  Theign,  in 
his  solitude,  with  the  young  man  out  of  earshot,  that 
vague  ironic  comment;  which  only  served  his  turn, 
none  the  less,  till,  bethinking  himself,  he  had  gone 

252 


THE  OUTCRY 

back  to  the  piece  of  furniture  used  for  his  late  scribble 
and  come  away  from  it  again  the  next  minute  deli 
cately  holding  a  fair  slip  that  we  naturally  recognise 
as  Mr.  Bender's  forgotten  cheque.  This  apparently 
surprising  value  he  now  studied  at  his  ease  and  to  the 
point  of  its  even  drawing  from  him  an  articulate 
"What  in  damnation — ?"  His  speculation  dropped 
before  the  return  of  his  hostess,  whose  approach 
through  the  other  room  fell  upon  his  ear  and  whom  he 
awaited  after  a  quick  thrust  of  the  cheque  into  his 
waistcoat. 

Lady  Sandgate  appeared  now  in  due — that  is  in  the 
most  happily  adjusted — splendour;  she  had  changed 
her  dress  for  something  smarter  and  more  appropriate 
to  the  entertainment  of  Princes.  "Tea  will  be  down 
stairs,"  she  said.  "But  you're  alone?" 

"I've  just  parted,"  her  friend  replied,  "with  Grace 
and  Mr.  Crimble." 

"'Parted'  with  them?" — the  ambiguity  struck  her. 

"Well,  they've  gone  out  together  to  flaunt  their 
monstrous  connection!" 

"  You  speak,"  she  laughed,  "as  if  it  were  too  gross — ! 
They're  surely  coming  back?" 

"Back  to  you,  if  you  like — but  not  to  me." 

"Ah,  what  are  you  and  I,"  she  tenderly  argued,  "but 
one  and  the  same  quantity  ?  And  though  you  may  not 
as  yet  absolutely  rejoice  in — well,  whatever  they're 


THE  OUTCRY 

doing,"  she  cheerfully  added,  "you'll  get  beautifully 
used  to  it." 

"That's  just  what  I'm  afraid  of— what  such  horrid 
matters  make  of  one!" 

"At  the  worst  then,  you  see" — she  maintained  her 
optimism — "the  recipient  of  royal  attentions!" 

"Oh,"  said  her  companion,  whom  his  honour 
seemed  to  leave  comparatively  cold,  "it's  simply  as  if 
the  gracious  Personage  were  coming  to  condole!" 

Impatient  of  the  lapse  of  time,  in  any  case,  she  as 
sured  herself  again  of  the  hour.  "Well,  if  he  only 
does  come!" 

"John— the  wretch!"  Lord  Theign  returned— " will 
take  care  of  that:  he  has  nailed  him  and  will  bring 
him." 

"  What  was  it  then,"  his  friend  found  occasion  in  the 
particular  tone  of  this  reference  to  demand,  "  what  was 
it  that,  when  you  sent  him  off,  John  spoke  of  you  in 
Bond  Street  as  specifically  intending?" 

Oh  he  saw  it  now  all  lucidly — if  not  rather  luridly 
— and  thereby  the  more  tragically.  "He  described 
me  in  his  nasty  rage  as  consistently — well,  heroic!" 

"His  rage" — she  pieced  it  sympathetically  out — 
"at  your  destroying  his  cherished  credit  with  Ben 
der?" 

Lord  Theign  was  more  and  more  possessed  of  this 
view  of  the  manner  of  it.  "I  had  come  between  him 

254 


THE  OUTCRY 

and  some  profit  that  he  doesn't  confess  to,  but  that 
made  him  viciously  and  vindictively  serve  me  up 
there,  as  he  caught  the  chance,  to  the  Prince — and  the 
People!" 

She  cast  about,  in  her  intimate  interest,  as  for 
some  closer  conception  of  it.  "By  saying  that  you 
had  remarked  here  that  you  offered  the  People  the 
picture ? 

"As  a  sacrifice — yes! — to  morbid,  though  respect 
able  scruples."  To  which  he  sharply  added,  as  if 
struck  with  her  easy  grasp  of  the  scene:  "But  I  hope 
you've  nothing  to  call  a  memory  for  any  such  ex 
travagance?" 

Lady  Sandgate  waited — then  boldly  took  her  line. 
"None  whatever!  You  had  reacted  against  Bender — 
but  you  hadn't  gone  so  far  as  thatl" 

He  had  it  now  all  vividly  before  him.  "I  had  re 
acted — like  a  gentleman;  but  it  didn't  thereby  follow 
that  I  acted — or  spoke — like  a  demagogue;  and  my 
mind's  a  complete  blank  on  the  subject  of  my  having 
done  so." 

"So  that  there  only  flushes  through  your  con 
science,"  she  suggested,  "the  fact  that  he  has  forced 
your  hand?" 

Fevered  with  the  sore  sense  of  it  his  lordship  wiped 
his  brow.  "He  has  played  me,  for  spite,  his  damned 
impertinent  trick!" 

255 


THE  OUTCRY 

She  found  but  after  a  minute — for  it  wasn't  easy — 
the  right  word,  or  the  least  wrong,  for  the  situation. 
"  Well,  even  if  he  did  so  diabolically  commit  you,  you 
still  don't  want — do  you? — to  back  out." 

Resenting  the  suggestion,  which  restored  all  his 
nobler  form,  Lord  Theign  fairly  drew  himself  up. 
"When  did  I  ever  in  all  my  life  back  out?" 

"Never,  never  in  all  your  life  of  course!" — she 
dashed  a  bucketful  at  the  flare.  "And  the  picture 
after  all 1" 

"The  picture  after  all" — he  took  her  up  in  cold 
grim  gallant  despair — "has  just  been  pronounced 
definitely  priceless."  And  then  to  meet  her  gaping 
ignorance:  "By  Mr.  Crimble's  latest  and  apparently 
greatest  adviser,  who  strongly  stamps  it  a  Mantovano 
and  whose  practical  affidavit  I  now  possess." 

Poor  Lady  Sandgate  gaped  but  the  more — she  won 
dered  and  yearned.  "  Definitely  priceless  ?  " 

"Definitely  priceless."  After  which  he  took  from 
its  place  of  lurking,  considerately  unfolding  it,  the 
goodly  slip  he  had  removed  from  her  blotting-book. 
"Worth  even  more  therefore  than  what  Bender  so 
blatantly  offers." 

Her  attention  fell  with  interest,  from  the  distance  at 
which  she  stood,  on  this  confirmatory  document,  her 
recognition  of  which  was  not  immediate.  "And  is 
that  the  affidavit?" 

256 


THE  OUTCRY 

"This  is  a  cheque  to  your  order,  my  lady,  for  ten 
thousand  pounds." 

"Ten  thousand?" — she  echoed  it  with  a  shout. 

"Drawn  by  some  hand  unknown,"  he  went  on 
quietly. 

"Unknown?" — again,  in  her  muffled  joy,  she  let  it 
sound  out. 

"  Which  I  found  there  at  your  desk  a  moment  ago, 
and  thought  best,  in  your  interest,  to  rescue  from  acci 
dent  or  neglect;  even  though  it  be,  save  for  the  single 
stroke  of  a  name  begun,"  he  wound  up  with  his  look 
like  a  playing  searchlight,  "unhappily  unsigned." 

"Unsigned?" — the  exhibition  of  her  design,  of  her 
defeat,  kept  shaking  her.  "Then  it  isn't  good ?" 

"It's  a  Barmecide  feast,  my  dear!" — he  had  still, 
her  kind  friend,  his  note  of  grimness  and  also  his  pene 
tration  of  eye.  "But  who  is  it  writes  you  colossal 
cheques?" 

"And  then  leaves  them  lying  about?"  Her  case 
was  so  bad  that  you  would  have  seen  how  she  felt  she 
must  do  something — something  quite  splendid.  She 
recovered  herself,  she  faced  the  situation  with  all  her 
bright  bravery  of  expression  and  aspect;  conscious, 
you  might  have  guessed,  that  she  had  never  more  stri 
kingly  embodied,  on  such  lines,  the  elegant,  the  beauti 
ful  and  the  true.  "Why,  who  can  it  have  been  but 
poor  Breckenridge  too?" 

257 


THE  OUTCRY 

" c  Breckenridge '—  ? "  Lord  Theign  had  his  smart 
echoes.  "  What  in  the  world  does  he  owe  you  money 
for?" 

It  took  her  but  an  instant  more — she  performed  the 
great  repudiation  quite  as  she  might  be  prepared  to 
sweep,  in  the  Presence  impending,  her  grandest  curt 
sey.  "Not,  you  sweet  suspicious  thing,  for  my  great- 
grandmother!"  And  then  as  his  glare  didn't  fade: 
"  Bender  makes  my  life  a  burden — for  the  love  of  my 
precious  Lawrence." 

"Which  you're  weakly  letting  him  grab?" — nothing 
could  have  been  finer  with  this  than  Lord  Theign's 
reprobation  unless  it  had  been  his  surprise. 

She  shook  her  head  as  in  bland  compassion  for  such 
an  idea.  "It  isn't  a  payment,  you  goose — it's  a  bribe! 
I've  withstood  him,  these  trying  weeks,  as  a  rock  the 
tempest;  but  he  wrote  that  and  left  it  there,  the  fiend, 
to  tempt  me — to  corrupt  me!" 

"Without  putting  his  name?" — her  companion 
again  turned  over  the  cheque. 

She  bethought  herself,  clearly  with  all  her  genius,  as 
to  this  anomaly,  and  the  light  of  reality  broke.  "He 
must  have  been  interrupted  in  the  artful  act — he 
sprang  up  with  such  a  bound  at  Mr.  Crimble's  news. 
At  once  then — for  his  interest  in  it — he  hurried  off, 
leaving  the  cheque  forgotten  and  unfinished."  She 
smiled  more  intensely,  her  eyes  attached,  as  from 

258 


THE  OUTCRY 

fascination,  to  the  morsel  of  paper  still  handled  by  her 
friend.  "  But  of  course  on  his  next  visit  he'll  add  his 
great  signature." 

"The  devil  he  will!"— and  Lord  Theign,  with  the 
highest  spirit,  tore  the  crisp  token  into  several  pieces, 
which  fluttered,  as  worthless  now  as  pure  snowflakes, 
to  the  floor. 

"Ay,  ay,  ay!" — it  drew  from  her  a  wail  of  which  the 
character,  for  its  sharp  inconsequence,  was  yet  comic. 

This  renewed  his  stare  at  her.  "Do  you  want  to 
back  out?  I  mean  from  your  noble  stand." 

As  quickly,  however,  she  had  saved  herself.  "I'd 
rather  do  even  what  you're  doing — offer  my  treasure 
to  the  Thingumbob!" 

He  was  touched  by  this  even  to  sympathy.  "Will 
you  then  join  me  in  setting  the  example  of  a  great 
donation ?" 

"To  the  What-do-you-call-it?"  she  extravagantly 
smiled. 

"I  call  it,"  he  said  with  dignity,  "the  ' National 
Gallery.'" 

She  closed  her  eyes  as  with  a  failure  of  breath.  "  Ah 
my  dear  friend !" 

"It  would  convince  me,"  he  went  on,  insistent  and 
persuasive. 

"Of  the  sincerity  of  my  affection?" — she  drew 
nearer  to  him. 

259 


THE  OUTCRY 

"It  would  comfort  me" — he  was  satisfied  with  his 
own  expression.  Yet  in  a  moment,  when  she  had 
come  all  rustlingly  and  fragrantly  close,  "It  would 
captivate  me,"  he  handsomely  added. 

"It  would  captivate  you?"  It  was  for  her,  we 
should  have  seen,  to  be  satisfied  with  his  expression; 
and,  with  our  more  informed  observation  of  all  it  was 
a  question  of  her  giving  up,  she  would  have  struck  us 
as  subtly  bargaining. 

He  gallantly  amplified.  "It  would  peculiarly — by 
which  I  mean  it  would  so  naturally — unite  us!" 

Well,  that  was  all  she  wanted.  "Then  for  a  com 
plete  union  with  you — of  fact  as  well  as  of  fond 
fancy!"  she  smiled — "there's  nothing,  even  to  my  one 
ewe  lamb,  I'm  not  ready  to  surrender." 

"Ah,  we  don't  surrender,"  he  urged — "we  enjoy!" 

"Yes,"  she  understood:  "with  the  glory  of  our 
grand  gift  thrown  in." 

"We  quite  swagger,"  he  gravely  observed— 
"though  even  swaggering  would  after  this  be  dull 
without  you." 

"Oh,  I'll  swagger  with  you!"  she  cried  as  if  it  quite 
settled  and  made  up  for  everything;  and  then  im 
patiently,  as  she  beheld  Lord  John,  whom  the  door 
had  burst  open  to  admit:  "The  Prince?" 

"The  Prince!" — the  young  man  launched  it  as  a 
call  to  arms. 

260 


THE  OUTCRY 

They  had  fallen  apart  on  the  irruption,  the  pair  dis 
covered,  but  she  flashed  straight  at  her  lover:  "Then 
we  can  swagger  now!" 

Lord  Theign  had  reached  the  open  door.  "  I  meet 
him  below." 

Demurring,  debating,  however,  she  stayed  him  a 
moment.  "But  oughtn't  I — in  my  own  house?" 

His  lordship  caught  her  meaning.  "You  mean  he 
may  think — ?"  But  he  as  easily  pronounced.  "He 
shall  think  the  Truth!"  And  with  a  kiss  of  his  hand 
to  her  he  was  gone. 

Lord  John,  who  had  gazed  in  some  wonder  at  these 
demonstrations,  was  quickly  about  to  follow,  but  she 
checked  him  with  an  authority  she  had  never  before 
used  and  which  was  clearly  the  next  moment  to  prove 
irresistible.  "Lord  John,  be  so  good  as  to  stop." 
Looking  about  at  the  condition  of  a  room  on  the 
point  of  receiving  so  august  a  character,  she  observed 
on  the  floor  the  fragments  of  the  torn  cheque,  to  which 
she  sharply  pointed.  "And  please  pick  up  that 
litter!" 


THE   END.  L*^~  ' 


RETURN  TO  the  circulation  desk  ot  any 
University  of  California  Library 

or  to  the 

NORTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY  _ 

Bldg.  400,  Richmond  Field  Station 
University  of  California 
Richmond,  CA  94804-4698 

ALL  BOOKS  MAY  BE  RECALLED  AFTER  7  DAYS  _ 

•  2-month  loans  may  be  renewed  by  calling 
(510)642-6753 

•  1 -year  loans  may  be  recharged  by  bringing         Dte 
books  to  NRLF  — 

•  Renewals  and  recharges  may  be  made  4  — 
days  prior  to  due  date. 

DUE  AS  STAMPED  BELOW 


MAY  3  1  2003 


12,000(11/95)  [El 


GENERAL  LIBRARY 'U.C.BERKELEY 


6000^203=15 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


